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107 


50 Cents 


ILovcll’s Unternational Seriee 


A 

Reverend Gentleman 


BV 

J. MACLAREN COBBAN 

Author ok ‘‘Tinted Vapors,” “Master of His Fate,” Etc. 


NEIV YORK 

JOHN W. LOVELL COMPANY 

150 Worth Street, corner Mission Place 


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CONTINUeO ON THIRD PAGE OF COVER. 


A EETEREND GENTLEMAN. 


7L, Cy) L4<ly*<-0 ^ 73u.’^/*'d<t) 

y '^cux^Oa.^Cl 4J^C^h/^ 

yU/i^ sf ^ 


A Reverend Gentleman. 





BY 



j: MACLAREN COBBAN, 

Author of “Tinted Vapours,” “Master of His Fate,” etc. 



O 




NEW YORK: 

JOHN W. LOVELL COMPANY, 

142 TO 150 Worth Street. 



Copyright, 1890, 

By John W. Lovell Company. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER I. 


Father and Daughter 

. 


Page. 

11 

CHAPTER 

11. 



Tristram Shandy^-' in Church 


19 

CHAPTER 

111. 



In the Night 



28 

CHAPTER 

IV. 



The Parson’s Monday 

• 


34 

CHAPTER 

V. 



The Parson makes Punch 

• 


38 

CHAPTER 

VI. 



Merry dew sees Clearly . 

• 


42 

CHAPTER 

VII. 



Two Appeals 

. 


46 

CHAPTER 

VIII. 



Mrs. Evans Speaks . 

• 


. 51 

CHAPTER 

IX. 



ViRGINIBUS PuERISQUE 

• 


55 

CHAPTER 

X. 



In Which Friends pall Out 

• 


64 

CHAPTER 

XL 



In Which Friends go Their Ways 


70 


CONTENTS. 


viii 


CHAPTER XII. 


The Parson’s Other Daughter 

. 

. 

Page. 

75 

CHAPTER Xlll. 

Sleight of Hand .... 



78 

CHAPTER XIV. 

“Taffy came to Our House . . 



84 

CHAPTER XV. 

The End of Things Welsh 



93 

. CHAPTER XVI. 

“ The Way of a Man with a Maid ” 



98 

CHAPTER XVII. 

In Pursuit 



103 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

Mutual Understandings 



107 

CHAPTER XIX. 

Waiting 



113 

CHAPTER XX. 

A Pair of Slippers . . 



119 

CHAPTER XXL 

Kate’s Arrival .... 


• 

128 

CHAPTER XXII. 

Kate’s Discovery .... 



132 

CHAPTER XXIII. 
Prospects of Fortune 



139 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

In Quest of Friends . \ . 


♦ 

146 


CONTENTS. 


IX 


CHAPTER XXV. 

After the Honeymoon .... 

Page. 

. 156 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

Sweetheart and Wife ..... 

. 160 

CHAPTER XXVII. 

A Safe Investment . . . . 

. 166 

CHAPTER XXVIII. 

Conjugal Trials 

. 175 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

A Wedding Feast 

. 185 

CHAPTER XXX. 

Conjugal Disaster 

. 190 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

Laughter and Tears .... 

. 196 

CHAPTER XXXII. 

Bottiglia Advises 

. 201 

CHAPTER XXXIII. 

Merrydew expresses an Opinion . 

. 207 

CHAPTER XXXIV. 

Alimony . 


CHAPTER XXXV. 

Atropos 

. 223 

CHAPTER XXXVI. 

The Way of Transgressors . 

. 230 

CHAPTER XXXVII. 
Between the Devil and the Deep Sea . 

V 237 


X 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

Page 

A Simple Solution 243 

CHAPTER XXXIX. 

How Kate becomes a Star, and meets an old 

Friend 248 

CHAPTER XL. 

The old Friend in a new Light . . . 257 

CHAPTER XLI. 

The House in Cheyne Walk .... 261 

CHAPTER XLIl. 

The Prodigal Husband’s Return . . . 266 

CHAPTER XLllI. 

Terror-stricken 271 

CHAPTER XLIV. 

Out of the Mouth of Babes .... 276 

CHAPTER XLV. 

The Captain’s Strategy 282 

CHAPTER XLVI. 

“None but the Brave” 290 

CHAPTER XLVII. 

The Lawyer sees his Way .... 301 

CHAPTER XLVIII. 

The Lawyer’s Mission 306 

CHAPTER XLIX. 

United 311 

CHAPTER L. 

The Conclusion of the AVhole Matter . , 318 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN 


CHAPTER 1. 

FATHER AND DAUGHTER. 

The Reverend William Merrydew, Master of Arts, and 
sometime “ Principal of a Private School for the Sons of 
Gentlemen/^ was, at the ‘opening of this story, on the 
wrong side of fifty. What his exact age was no one, not 
even his daughters, knew, or could easily guess. Some- 
times he looked much less than fifty, and sometimes a 
good deal more. He never mentioned his age explicitly, 
nor let it out by implication; for whenever he told of any 
notable event in his history, his allusions to contemporary 
public events were carefully vague. The only admission 
his daughters considered of chronological worth was that 
he was “ a young fellow at college when the bells rang 
out the capture of Sebastopol. He indeed often called 
himself “ an old fellow,^^ but it was with the Jaunty air of 
a man who does not expect to be believed. Mr. Merry- 
dew was — or, at least, had been — a scholar; he was a man 
of strong social instincts (the most valuable possession of 
a clergyman); yet, here he was at this date, vicar of a 
poor W elsh parish — Glyndf rdwy, at the foot of Moel He- 
bog. 

Mr. Merrydew^s situation may seem strange, but it had 
been arrived at by the usual gradual evolutionary process. 
He had begun life as the kind of person we call a scholar 
and a gentleman. He had taken Orders, not because he 
had any intention of going into the Church, but merely 
because he knew it was the respectable English habit to 
prefer a reverend gentleman for the education of youth, 
and he had been offered a mastership in a good school. 
Mr. Merrydew had designs upon literature, and it was to 
ultimately accomplish them that he sat down for awhile to 


12 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


the weary routine of gerund-grinding. For some years he 
worked very hard, tiJl the thanklessness and unproduc- 
tiveness of the teacher^s lot smote his heart with dullness 
and despondency, as they ever must smite any one who has 
a tolerably full sense of life and a less than overflowing 
love of youth. He would have liked to give up teaching and 
trust for a living to literature (he had tried his hand at writ- 
ing and had published little things in one or two of the ob- 
scurer magazines), but he feared to make the hazardous 
experiment. So he gradually became the man who cher- 
ishes an ideal which every one but himself can plainly see 
he will never attain to. Still dreaming of other things, he 
allowed himself to become engaged to and to marry his em- 
ployer’s only child and housekeeper, to become a partner in 
the school business, and finally (upon the senior’s death) 
proprietor and principal of the whole concern. Thus he 
drifted on, in the comfort of married life, learning more 
and more to value the satisfaction of his appetites, and less 
and less to cherish an ideal. By and by his wife died, 
leaving him two daughters not yet in their teens. His wife 
had been the real manager of the school, and when she died 
things went from bad to worse, through no particular 
misconduct on the part of the reverend principal.. He sold 
the school, and then began a period of varying fortune. 
He tried to edit a religious newspaper, and proved too sin- 
cerely flippant for his proprietors; he gave lessons at so 
much an hour, and either gave too little or took too much, 
for his clients failed him; and he again took to school-keep- 
ing “for the sons of gentlemen.” Throughout that 
chequered time there is no doubt he was cheerful and “ of 
a good courage;” not so much because he was naturally 
a brave man as because he was essentially a bohemian, who 
loved freedom and unrestrained commerce with his kind. 
At length the last school lapsed from him on a mortgage, 
and he and his daughters were without a prospect, till a 
friend found a place as governess for the cleverer of the 
two girls, and the small Welsh living of Glyndfrdwy for 
Merrydew himself. 

It was the morning of a Saturday, in the end of Febru- 
ary, 1877. The landscape, as seen from the parsonage win- 
dows, was grand, dazzling, and inspiring. The air was 
crisp and clear, and musical with the sound of rushing 
water. The lowest slopes oF the mountain opposite had 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


13 


shed their winter coat of white, and now appeared in that 
suit of sodden and yellowed green which makes the earliest 
days of spring wear such a tumbled and lie-abed aspect. 
The upward mountain ridges and lofty storm-swept crags 
were still clothed in their soft, treacherous white, which, 
now that the sun poured his light upon it, so dazzled the 
eyes as to make the head almost ache. It was one of those 
rare mornings when the top of the mountain was clearly 
visible. Yet, for all this, at ten o’clock the vicar sat in his 
little parlor at breakfast, wrapped in a faded flowered dress- 
ing-gown. The vicar’s character and taste had been formed 
in a day, and among a set in which rhapsodical views of 
Nature were not in vogue. He sat with his back to the 
light, near the fire, half-turned from the table, with a neat 
slippered foot on the fender. He had his tea-cup in one 
hand, and “ Tristram Shandy ” in the other. 

“ Ho, ho, ho! He, he, he!” he laughed, as he turned 
for a moment to sip his tea and look at the toast-rack. 
His laugh did not sound hearty or wholesome; it was, in- 
deed, rather a half- smothered snigger than an open laugh. 
It evidently displeased his daughter, a girl of nineteen or 
twenty, with bright, candid gray eyes, an abundance of 
fair, wavy hair, and a marvellously clear complexion. He 
caught her odd look of scrutiny levelled at him from behind 
the tea-pot. “ Well, my dear?” said he, helping himself 
to toast. 

“ I don’t like to hear you laugh like that, father; it 
makes me think 1 don’t know what. It makes me afraid 
of something.” 

“ H’m, it’s Sterne’s— er— wit, my child,” said the 
vicar, turning again to his book. 

“ Have you forgotten, father, this is Saturday? Your 
sermons are not ready for Sunday.” 

“ Oh, con — sider the sermons! Gad, I’ll read a chapter 
or two of Sterne! These barbarians won’t know the differ- 
ence, and it will be greater fun to me. What is it, girl?” 

The abrupt question was caused by the sudden flight of 
his daughter to the window, where she stood looking eager- 
ly up th^e lane that passed the house. 

“ Two gentlemen, father; tourists, 1 suppose, going up 
the lane with old Parry.” 

In a moment “ Tristram Shandy ” was thrown on the 
table, and the vicar was at the window. 


14 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


“Where are they? Which way? Ah, th'eyVe turned 
the corner, I suppose. What had they on, child? fishing 
boots? Old Parry was with them; they must have come 
for the fishing. Very likely they^re staying at The Turk^s 
Head. 1^11 take a turn down that way and see. Where 
are my boots? I must shave before 1 go, though; they 
may have some ladies with ^em. And I must have Farmer 
Jones’s pony.” He went to the door and shouted in a 
frantic voice, “ Tavvy C/dooid! Tavvy C/dooid!” 

After a little there leisurely emerged from the cow-house 
a middle-aged man without a hat, but with a shock head 
of iron-grey hair, to whom the vicar jabbered something in 
Welsh. It would appear from the sequel that the man’s 
name was that which is spelled thus in English, “ David 
Lloyd,” and that the vicar had called him to go and bor- 
row Farmer Jones’s pony. 

The vicar returned indoors, and went at once upstairs. 
He shaved, he dressed himself in his Sunday best, whistling 
and humming the most unclerical tunes — scraps from 
“ Eobert the Devil ” and from “ Dinorah ” and echoes of 
even such music-hall ditties as long ago roused the ire of 
dear Colonel Newcome. He put on his thin, best boots, 
and seeing the shock-headed Tavvy leading Farmer Jones’s 
pony to the door, he descended. 

“ Ethel, my girl,” said he to his expectant daughter, 
“ don’t wait dinner for me. ” 

“ Very well, father. If any one asks you, you’ll be wise 
to accept; for there’s only the remains of yesterday’s broth 
to warm up, and the mutton-bone to pick.” 

“ Ah, that bone, dear, would be beautiful devilled. I 
should like it done so for supper.” 

“ Very well, father. I’ll keep it and do it. Kiss me, 
daddy, before you go.” 

“ My love.” He kissed her, and turned at once to look 
at the rough-coated pony. 

“ Humph! ’Tain’t much of a hack, is it? Look at 
those stirrup-irons and that bit! Jones might have rubbed 
’em up a bit. Well!” 

He mounted. Tavvy led the wild-eyed, shock-maned 
creature out at the gate; and parson and pony trotted down 
the lane. The lane was muddy with the stickiest and 
deepest of Welsh mud; and, by-and-bye, as the village was 
approached, it was alive with fierce, active little pigs, lean 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


15 


as greyhounds, and red as fire. It might be an interest- 
ing ethnological question whether the Celtic races have 
always throughout their history been attended by mud, 
squalor, and lean pigs. A thought of this sort passed side- 
ways through the attention of Mr. Merrydew, who was 
himself half a Welshman, and who had seen the world. 
But the notion slipped in and slipped out again by the 
merest corner; the large space of his attention was given 
to wondering who were these early comers to the outland- 
ish fishing-ground of Glyndfrdwy? How many of them 
were there? Were they sociable or not? Would they like 
him? Would they ask him to dinner? If there were ladies 
in the party, would they ask him to stay to lunch? That 
was surely the least they could do for the parson of the 
wretched parish in which they were sojourning. 

The Turk’s Head, a low, irregular building, stood at 
one side of a kind of green at the farther end of the village. 
The vicar alighted at the door, the pony at once shook out 
his shock mane, and trotted oft to roll on the grass. 
Summoning a leggy and unintelligible boy from the stable- 
yard to bring it back, he entered the bar. 

“ Good morning, Mrs. Evans. Er — , let me have a 
glass of your Llangollen ale.” 

“ Good morning, Mr. Merrydew, sir,” said the landlady, 
drawing the ale and eyeing his clean-shaven face and his 
best coat. “ Is Miss Ethel pretty well, sir?” 

“ Very well, Mrs. Evans. She was a good deal surprised 
and excited, you know — this is a nice-smacking brew, 
ma’am — yes, a good deal excited by the vision of two gen- 
tlemen passing up our lane this morning.” 

“ Oh, sir; they would be the two nice gentlemen come 
yesterday to stay a week or two for the fishing of the salm- 
on. ” 

“ Ah, now, I thought as much. Staying here, of 
course?” 

“ Of course, sir, Mr. Merrydew. No gentleman that 
knows what is good accommodation would go to The 
Gwydyr, where there is not a parlour, nothing but a dirty, 
smoky kitchen for all and everything, hens and cocks in- 
cluded. No, Mr. Merrydew, sir, and begging your par- 
don. The two gentlemen were recommended here from 
Oswestry, from The Ked Lion; and Mr. Davies of The 
Eed Lion knows me, and knows I was a good whole year 


16 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


iri an English hotel, and knows that 1 know English nice 
things and English cooking. 

“ That you do, Mrs. Evans, The two — 

“ As the two gentlemen said last night, sir, when I took 
them in a dish of fresh trout for their first course. Says 
the one of them to the other one of them, in the familiar 
way gentlemen always speak, ‘ Parkin, this is jolly!' " 

‘‘ Parkin? Did you say ‘ Parkin '?" 

“ I did say so, sir; and a nice name and a nice gentle- 
man to my taste, sir, though perhaps not to everybody's. 
Eor some people may say, ‘ Parkin here. Parkin there; 
Parkin is only the name of a treacly cake they make in a 
country they call Yorkshire, somewhere on the other side 
of England. ' And true enough, sir, it is from that coun- 
try the gentleman comes, though he speaks beautiful En- 
glish; and as 1 said to him last night when I was clearing 
away, ‘Sir,' says I, ‘ if parkin is a treacle cake, a very 
nice cake it must be.' " 

“ From Yorkshire, do you say? It must be Jack." 

“That it is. For I heard the other one say, ‘Jack.' 
And now, Mr. Merrydew, sir, perhaps the gentleman is a 
friend of yours. But that cannot very well be, for he is 
young, and begging your pardon again, sir, but you are 
not quite altogether young; though I will say, as I have 
said over and over again, sir, ‘ Mr. Merrydew,' says I, 

‘ may be fifty or sixty, but a younger-dispositioned man, 
and a jollier, I never did know.' " 

“ Ah, you fiatter me, Mrs. Evans. 1 am an old fellow, 
oh, yes, I am. But 1 am not tired of the world, as that 
snivelling Dissenter you go to hear pretends he is. I beg 
your pardon, Mrs. Evans; I shouldn't say that. But did 
you happen to hear what part of Yorkshire Mr. Parkin was 
from?" 

“ Well, no; not exactly. But it's all down, sir, in black 
and white in the book. 

So saying, she rose and went out. Mr. Merrydew 
'Went to the window, and talked thus with himself: “If 
it should be, wouldn’t it be odd he should turn up 
here? Left Cambridge, I suppose, or he wouldn't be run- 
ning about now. Clever Jack-— I should like to see him — 
particularly clever he was at mathematics; I never taught 
a cleverer lad. But times are changed. Should I seek 
him now, or should I let him seek me?" 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


17 


“ Here, sir, is the name,^^ said Mrs. Evans, returning 
with the visitors’ book. 

Mr. Merrydew put on his glasses, took it, and read on 
the open page, “ John E. Parkin, Kirby Hall, Sherborne, 
Yorkshire. ” 

“ Is that the gentleman, sir?” 

“It is.” 

“ The other gentleman’s underneath. Perhaps, sir, 
you know him also. ” 

Mr. Merrydew read: “‘George Cardigan, Sherborne, 
Yorkshire.’ No,” said he, “ I don’t know him. Thank 
you, Mrs. Evans (returning her the book). They’re not 
coming back till it’s dark, I suppose?” 

“ They’ve ordered dinner, sir, for six o’clock. A steak 
of salmon, sir, if so be they catch any fish: you like a salm- 
on steak, I know. You will very likely look in and have 
your dinner with your friend, 1 suppose, Mr. Merrydew, 
sir?” 

“ Ye-es, Mrs. Evans, very likely.” 

“ And there’s a pullet, sir, and the nicest little leg of 
mutton.” 

“And some puddings, of course, Mrs. Evans — eh? 
Those little lemon puddings you make so delicious, I sup- 
pose?” 

“ Well, sir, they did not mention pudding; but I’m sure 
two or three of my nice little lemon things, as you say, sir, 
can never come wrong.” 

“Just so, Mrs. Evans. Six o’clock. I won’t forget. 
They’ve gone fishing with old Parry, haven’t they? Good 
morning. ” 

Mr. Merrydew, with a nod and a smile which made Mrs. 
Evans tingle with pleasure to the very bugles of her black 
cap, went forth and remounted, with a muttered curse at 
the saddle, which Jones’s pony had not been careful to 
keep clean in taking his roll on the wintry grass. He 
would have been willing to proceed homeward at a walk; 
but Jones’s pony knew which way his nose was turned, 
and insisted on a trot. This very exhilarating exercise 
through the clear, cold air and sunshine encouraged 
thoughts of lunch. The parson was in the habit of dining 
at two o’clock, but to-day Providence had provided him a 
special dinner for six o’clock, and he would keep an ap- 
petite for it. A little warmed-up broth, his daughter had 


IS A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 

said, would be the dinner at home. He could not think of 
depriving her of any of that; and the mutton-bone devilled, 
if he did not have it for supper, would be excellent for to- 
morrow's breakfast. What now (and the thought inspired 
his friendship with fresh ardour) — wdiat if he should ride 
on to the river, find Parkin, and share his lunch? 

Jones's pony readily carried him as far as the parsonage 
gate, but when the parson insisted he should stop there, 
the pony showed the white of a very bright, wicked eye, 
and screwed himself round and round in the mud till the 
big, shock-headed Tavvy came, and by main force hauled 
him into the yard. 

“ Ethel," said Merrydew, meeting his daughter at the 
door, “ who do you think the gentlemen are?" 

“Any I know, father? They must be, by your look." 
And the girl's face flushed and paled like spring sunshine. 

“ Well, one of them is; I don’t suppose you know the 
other more than I do, and that's not at all. Do you re- 
member when we lived at Hampstead — how many years 
ago will that be? Dear me, how many? Only six, isn't 
it? — do you remember that handsome, resolute-looking 
boy, with dark, curly hair, and a great turn for mathe- 
matics?" 

“ You don’t mean Jack Parkin, father?" 

“Yes, I do. You remember him, then? Yes, yes; he 
was a friend of yours." 

“ Oh, yes," said she, with a fine blush; “ 1 recollect 
him. You will bring him here, of course. But where 
shall we put him? A guest must have a decent room." 

“ H'm," murmured her father, scratching his cheek; 
“ I dare say he and his friend are pretty comfortable with 
Mrs. Evans. But I'm going to change my things, and 
then I'll go and find Parkin at his fishing. And I'll very 
likely go on with him to The Turk's Head and have din- 
ner; so, my dear, 1 may be late." 

Without regarding his daughter's downcast look, he 
passed hurriedly on to his room. In a few minutes he re- 
appeared in his rough, week-day raiment, and again 
mounted and urged forward Farmer Jones's reluctant 
pony. 

Ethel stood at the gate looking after him till he was out 
of sight. Then she returned to the little dark parlour, and 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


19 


wrapped herself about with a sense of loneliness and disap- 
pointment. 

“ He does not care/^ she said to herself, “ how 1 feel! 
Do I not need t) see friends in this dreadful place as much 
as he does?^^ 

But it was better to remember and to dream than to 
mope; so she went and sat by the window, and thought of 
Jack Parkin, who had come, a kind of embodied memory, 
but of her bright past. 


CHAPTER II. 

TRISTRAM SHANDY IN CHURCH. 

Ethel sat up for her father till long after her usual 
time for going to bed, in the hope of getting news of the 
friend of her girlhood. But her father did not come, and 
at length, weary of waiting, she went to her room. She 
had a forlorn sense of being neglected by her father and 
uninteresting to everybody, and she crept into bed and 
cried. She cried herself to sleep, from which she was 
waked by her father^s stumbling on the stairs on his way 
to his room. 

Next morning he came down late for breakfast. He 
hurried through his meal on the pretence that he feared 
being late for morning service, but really because he felt 
uncomfortable under his daughter's reproachful looks. 
He gave her little opportunity for open complaint. 

“ Well, my dear,^^ said he, “ it is our Jack Parkin and 
a friend of his. Two capital young fellows; they were 
such excellent company that— er — I am afraid, my dear, 
1 stayed rather late. I asked them to come to dinner with 
us to-day.^' 

And are they coming she asked, preparing to rise. 

“ No, my dear; they begged to be excused. They won^t 
have breakfast much before twelve, and they couldnH be 
ready to eat again at one. But they will come along in 
the afternoon, pretty early. 

The hope of this diversion in the midst of her dull round 
of duty at once brightened the prospect of the rest of the 
day for Ethel. During the remainder of the meal she was 
oblivious of her father^s presence and her father's needs. 
With her attention quite withdrawn from such common 
interests as tea and toast, she pondered anxiously what she 


510 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


would put on. Her father noted her abstraction, and was 
glad of it. He finished breakfast without her aid, and 
then slipped away to prepare for the service of the Church. 

Mr. Merrydew was not his usual selfish, cheerful self 
that morning. While he stood meditating for a few mo- 
ments in his own room, he put his hands in his pockets, 
and sadly shook his head; his pockets were empty. They 
had been far from full the day before, but they had con- 
tained a certain amount of gold and silver; now they were 
quite flaccid and silent. 'His agreeable young friends of 
the evening before appeared in the gray morning light as 
enemies; they had won from him at cards. His old pupil. 
Jack Parkin, appeared to him now especially sinister; he 
had beaten him in old games and in new ones, and had 
carelessly swept up his money. He felt it had been very 
unfriendly and somehow disrespectful in the young man to 
have both beaten him in skill and emptied his pockets. 
By ail odd reflection, he then thought of his daughter, 
whose reproachful looks had disquieted him not a little. 
It was not agreeable at such a moment to believe that his 
ever-dutiful, ever-affectionate child should feel grudging 
and rebellious towards him. He perfectly understood her 
sense of injury; he had hindered her from seeing, so early 
as himself, and talking with her old friend of those distant 
happy school-days. Well, he admitted to himself, he 
should not have done that; it was not kind, and it had 
been productive of misfortune. It would have been better' 
for him if he had considered her. 

Merrydew was a kind of man common enough. He had 
no conscience to speak of, but he had the utmost sensitive- 
ness to all sorts of anxiety and trouble; and that often pro- 
duced in him the same results as conscience and sympathy 
in a better man— just as by electro-plating an appearance 
can be produced as of solid gold. So he resolved he would 
be kinder to his daughter, and he would begin at once by 
giving her every opportunity of conversing with Jack Par- 
kin; and who knew but that that might modify the young 
man’s sinister cleverness with the cards? With such small 
beginnings do great issues begin to work. 

He met his daughter as he went out to church. He 
kissed her, called her, “ My dear girl,” and recommended 
her, with a smile, to prepare herself to meet her old play- 
fellow. 


A REVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


21 


The parson was dozing in his chair after dinner when 
his daughter flew in with her eyes bright, and the wind in 
her hair. 

“ Father, they're comiug down the lane —it must be 
them — in a dog-cart 

“ In a dog-cart he exclaimed, and ran out without his 
hat, while Ethel looked on from the parlour window. 

“ What, Jack?^^ asked Merrydew. “ What does the 
trap mean?’^ 

“ I want to take you and Miss Merrydew for a drive, 
said the young man, descending from the vehicle. 

“ IFs Sunday, you know. Jack; but we must see. 
You’ll come in, however. Tavvy will hold the horse. 
Ah, here he is — a specimen— a fine specimen — of the native 
Briton; language old as Adam; manners and customs, 
ditto. T/ie name to him is to David. You remember 
your Latin exercises, and how you did not like them, eh? 
Ah, yes; and this is the little girl who used to beg olf your 
impositions. Her sister, as 1 told you, is earning her bread 
and butter as a governess.” 

Jack Parkin, and his comrade, George Cardigan, were 
thereupon introduced at the door to a bright, smiling 
young lady. Jack’s manner, which until then had been 
somewhat reserved, became at once attentive. He listened 
to Merrydew’s cackle, as if it were the wittiest and wisest 
talk, and he responded with lively words of his own, keep- 
ing the while a referring and admiring eye on Ethel. With 
her fair hair bound neatly up, her shapely figure set off 
with a close-fitting blue serge, and a flush of excitement 
on her clear face, she was beautiful enough to attract lin- 
gering looks from any man, much more from an old friend 
and playmate who could recollect the slim, frank girl of 
six years before, and wonder at the shyness and the soft 
beauty of womanhood the years had brought. She, for her 
part, could hear in Jack’s virile tones the breaking treble 
of seventeen, and could see a smooth, downy cheek beyond 
the thinner, shaven one before her, and a less heavy mouth 
(‘‘ resolute,” she called it to herself) than that which the 
black moustache now shaded. 

But Jack said they must not linger talking there, if 
they were to have a drive before the sun sank; and they 
could talk just as well in the trap. It was speedily settled 
that the young men should take Ethel with them. The 


22 


A REVEEKND GENTLEMAN. 


parson excused himself, on the sufficient plea that his 
evening sermon was not ready. 

“ Look here, you know,^’ said George Cardigan, a large, 
ruddy young man, ‘‘it seems to me I^m not needed.^^ 
He felt in prospect the discomfort of being a third person. 

“ Go on, George, said his friend, “you can sit behind 
and balance the trap.’^ 

When they were gone, Mr. Merrydew, satisfied that he 
had for once been thoughtfully kind to his daughter, sat 
down in the parlour to consider his evening sermon. That 
sermon was his most irksome duty, yet, with a character- 
istic mixture of vanity and indolence, he would never adopt 
the shift of many of his clerical brethren, and adapt or 
“convey’^ a sermon from a book. He boasted tliat he 
had never read a sermon in his life. The only theological 
work in his small library was an old Bible, with Matthew 
Henry’s Commentary and very curious engravings, and 
even this he never opened except to look at the quaint pict- 
ures, and talk about them in a way to make the hair of the 
orthodox bibliolator stand on end. The production of a 
sermon was with him always a very congested and windy 
process; not that he lacked a certain facility of composition 
and cleverness of idea, but that his cleverness and facility 
had been learnt, and for the most part practised, on quite 
other subjects than “ The Whole Duty of Man,” and the 
“ Evidences of Christianity.” Sermon writing, then, was 
to him the most grinding and hardening duty of his office; 
and a sermon when produced was a thing to be wondered 
at for monstrosity and insincerity. 

Thus, after an excursion to the sideboard (during which 
he prepared and swallowed a mixture of whisky and water) 
he drew his easy-chair up to the fire, and, with his blot- 
ting-pad and writing paper on his knee, proceeded to try 
and evolve his composition for that evening. He wrote 
his text down with great dash, and deftly divided it into 
“firstly, secondly, thirdly, and review of the whole” — 

“ just like a d d charade,” he said to himself. That 

done, he prepared to write under the head of Firstly. He 
looked at his pen, stared at the fire, glanced up at the 
cover of “Tristram Shandy” reclining on the -mantel- 
shelf, and looked at his pen again; hefidgetted and fretted, 
and at length got up, walked up and down the room, and 
then looked out of the window. He pared his nails, glaiic- 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


23 


ing between -whiles at his fairly written text and divisions. 
Then he bethought him his feet were rather cold: he went 
and changed his socks. Eeturning downstairs, he heard 
a scuffle in the kitchen. “ It^s that Miriam and her 
sweetheart,^^ and he slipped in on tip-toe to surprise them. 
Miriam, the Welsh servant, was alone; the scuffle had been 
caused by her attempt to chastise the cat for getting at the 
milk. He lingered, and teased Miriam about her Parry 
Jones, and joked' with her in a very friendly way, till he 
heard voices in the little courtyard, and he returned with 
speed to the parlour. 

“Finished your sermon, father said Ethel, with a 
crisp, cheerful accent, taking o2 her hat, and pushing back 
her hair from her fair, fresh face — the fairer and fresher 
for her drive. 

“ No,’^ said he, somewhat snappishly, standing with his 
back to the fire. Ethel passed out of the room. “ Cu — 
confound the sermon! I have a great mind to read them 
a chapter or two of ‘ Tristram Shandy ^ here — only that 
it^s too good to waste on their barbarous Welsh ears.'’^ 

“ I wish you would, said Parkin, with a laugh; “ it 
would be the best bit of fun; but, ah! you wouldnT vent- 
ure to do it. Come now, then. Til lay you ten to one you 
donT read in church to-night, instead of a sermon, five 
pages of this ‘ Tristram Shandy^ — oh! any five you like. 
Novv.^^ 

“ You dare me to do it?'^ Merrydew thought of his 
empty pockets; ten pounds was a sum. 

“What sort of book is ‘Tristram Shandy asked 
George Cardigan, who was better acquainted with flies and 
fish than with literature. 

“ A stunning book,"" said Parkin, handing it to him. 

“ You wager,"" continued Merrydew, “ I won"t do it? 
You lay me ten pounds? Five pages — "" 

“ Consecutive pages,"" said Parkin. 

“ Agreed. There will be no difficulty about it; because, 
you see, not a soul who knows English comes to church — 
they all go to Zion. I"ll win the money very easily. But,"’ 
he continued, seeing that Parkin gnawed his moustache, as 
if in regret of his hasty bet, “for your delectation Fll 
choose one of the wittiest parts. It will be a hundred 
times better than a sermon. You will enjoy yourselves in 
church for once."" 


24 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


“ Come, George, said Parkin, turning to his friend, 
“ aren’t you going to lay something on the event?” 

“ No,” said George, laying down the book, and gazing 
curiously at the parson. “Well, I dcn’t care, I’ll lay a 
quid; it has nothing to do with me. I suppose Miss 
Merrydew is not going to church, then?” 

“ Oh, yes, she is,” said Ethel herself, opening the door 
behind them. “ I always go of an evening.” 

“ Yes, my dear,” said Merrydew, “ but you had better 
stay at home to-night. You will be tired after your 
drive.” 

“ Tired?” She laughed, and looked round from one to 
another. “ Oh, 1 can’t miss church, father. You 
couldn’t get on with your sermon if I were not there, un- 
der your eye. I’m almost always,” said she, turning to 
Jack, “ the only one present who understands him.” 

“ I daresay,” said Jack. 

There was an equivoque in this, unwitting on Ethel’s 
part, which Merrydew evidently did not like. 

“ I do not wish you to go to-night, Ethel,” said he, with 
a rather cross accent. “ Now, my dear ” — seeing signs of 
affliction appear — “ I do not, you know, absolutely lay my 
prohibition on your going, but I strongly advise you to re- 
main at home. The fact is,” said he, on a sudden 
thought, “ I’m inclined to suspect Miriam and her sweet- 
heart ” 

“ Of what, father?” 

“ Of being no better than ‘ Amandus, he; Amanda, she; 
and Amandum it;’ ” and with that he laughed, and 
glanced at Jack Parkin, who laughed too. Ethel turned 
away without looking at Jack. 

“ It’s a pity,” said Jack, “ Miss Ethel can’t go,” hastily 
adding, in answer to Merrydew’s look, “Is it necessary to 
have a sermon to-night?” 

“Yes,” chimed in George Cardigan; “ why have a ser- 
mon at all?” 

“ That’s a question,” said Merrydew, “ I often ask my- 
self. But I am bound by penalties to have an English 
service and an English sermon once a day. ” 

“ Ah, well, if it were me,” said Jack, “ I should preach 
somebody else’s sermons.” 

“Yes, some men bring themselves to that. Por my 
part, I could never either s^teal or buy another man’s ser- 


A KEYEREND GENTLEMAK. 


25 


mon; another man’s style would never suit me, any more 
than his hat or boots ” (with a glance down at his own 
well-shaped foot). “ My sermons are of my own sort; I 
do them quite in my own way, and a deuced costive busi- 
ness it is with me, sometimes. Ethel, my love, are you 
not going to make us some tea?” 

It must be a fearful grind,” said George, “and if it 
were me, I should feel such an awful hypocrite to talk 
about the things parsons do in sermons.” 

“ Why, now, why? If you yourself never took good 
advice, you’re the more likely to have some to give to other 
pe ' 



nothing to say, not having yet, for 


his own part, set aside much good advice. Jack Parkin 
put in his word. 

“ Advice! I don’t mind advice from a doctor; that’s 
worth something — ” 

“ And you pay something for it,” said Merrydew. 

“ As for other kinds of advice, they’re well enough for 
girls and women; a man must find his way through life 
for himself.” 

“ Is a man,” asked Ethel, with some pique, while she 
arranged four of her best china cups on the tray, “ better 
able to find his way than a woman?” 

“ Than most women,” replied Jack. 

“ A man, you see, my child,” said Merrydew, “ com- 
monly finds his way better, because he has to look after 
himself, and sometimes one or two others.” 

“ Then, sister Kate,” said Ethel, with an irrelevance 
which evidently annoyed her father, “should be able to 
find her way in life quite as well as any man.” 

“Yes. Have you not got tea ready yet?” 

When they sat down to tea. Jack Parkin began to ask 
Ethel about Kate, whom he recollected as curiously like, 
and as curiously unlike, her sister; like in figure and face, 
and unlike in conduct — a staid, clear-eyed girl, who un- 
dertook the responsibility of boys’ pocket money and but- 
tons. Merrydew let them talk, and George Cardigan lis- 
ten, while he himself sipped his tea with the enjoyment of 
an old woman, and selected a passage for his sermon from 
the word of Laurence Sterne. 

The darkness began to fill the room, while the fire blinked 
in their faces, made their eyes shine, and awoke in at least 


26 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


two of them idle thoughts and soft desires. When tea was 
over and the lamp lit, it was time to prepare to go to 
church. The Reverend William Merrydew, when his hat 
was brushed and on his head, and he was about to take up 
“ Tristram Shandy before stepping out into the dark- 
ness, for the first time felt a chill wave of misgiving pass 
over him at what he was about to do. He had in his time 
done and said many audacious things, but never before 
had he played such a prank as this he had arranged. If 
orthodox people should hear of it, he knew they would cry 
out against him for sacrilege and blasphemy! He paused 
a moment. 

“ Have you got your sermon?’^ asked Parkin, with a 
smile. 

“ Yes,^^ said Merrydew. He put “ Tristram in his 
pocket, and walked out to church. 

The words “ Here endeth the order of Evening Prayer 
had been reached; the two young English friends of the 
parson had closed their books, and the few simple Welsh 
folk present seeing that had closed theirs too. The sexton 
stumbled up the pulpit steps to raise the light of the 
paraffine lamp that swung above the pulpit desk; the two 
young men glanced at each other, settled themselves as if 
they were at the theatre; and the curtain was about to rise 
on a new burlesque; and the Welsh folk looked, some with 
a dull curiosity at the Englishmen, and others vacantly at 
the pulpit, leaning on the corners of the pews, or against 
the great, rough-hewn pillars of the little church. While the 
church was thus without voice, the Reverend Mr. Merrydew 
was hastily changing his surplice for his gown in the vest- 
ry. That done, he gently turned the key of the door, went 
swiftly to a small corner cupboard, unlocked it, took one, 
two, three pulls at a bottle, again locked it away, dabbed 
his mouth with his handkerchief, took “ Tristram Shandy 
in his hand, and, with a “ Confound it, here goes!'^ let 
himself out, and passed on to the pulpit. He had the 
grace to neglect the preliminary short prayer. He gave 
out, with great coolness, and a glance at his two friends, 
“The second book of ‘Shandy,^ from the seventeenth 
chapter.’’ Two or three devout women, who knew some 
English sounds, and seemed determined to try to find the 
text, and guess at the sermon, looked bewildered, and fum- 
bled their Bibles, till they saw that the two Englishmen 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


27 


had their books closed before them, when they closed theirs 
too. Merrydew began by announcing the sentence, “ For 
we trust we have a good conscience.'” It was Corporal 
Trim’s excellent sermon he had set himself to read, and he 
read straight on, omitting none of the parenthetical com- 
ments of Mr. Shandy and the rest. The first passage of 
dialogue was long (as any one may discover), and Mr. 
Merrydew’s young friends listened with a piqued attention, 
evidently in the expectation of all the reading being in that 
variety; presently, however, they found it was truly a ser- 
mon they had to listen to, and they looked disappointed 
and sold. But Merrydew read on, and it must be admitted 
he read well. 

The book was one he knew almost by heart, and his read- 
ing was forcible, even dramatic. Ilis clear, well-modulated 
voice, with the unusual variation and slight gestures neces- 
sary for a due performance of his task, kept awake the 
Welsh folk, and arrested their attention. They observed 
and listened intently, wdth wonder, and without under- 
standing, frequently casting puzzled glances at the two 
strangers, who now and then smiled, and seemed inclined 
to laughter. At a certain passage the mirth of the two 
strangers broke bounds, re-echoed through the church, 
roused the sexton from his corner, and attracted to them 
the eyes of the rest of the congregation, till they were still 
more amazed by the laugh being taken up in the pulpit by 
the parson himself. Just at that moment Merrydew hap- 
pened to glance at the door of the porch, perhaps because 
it moved. The door was a little ajar, and he caught the 
light of an eye steadily regarding him. He stopped an in- 
stant, pale and dumb, and them resumed with changed 
voice and hurried accent, and speedily brought his reading 
to an end. 

“ Did you,” he asked of the sexton, in Welsh, when he 
had reached the vestry, “ did you lock the outer door of 
the porch as usual?” 

“Yes, sir,” said the sexton; “ but when I went now to 
let the people out the door was open, and the key in it. ” 

The Keverend Mr. Merrydew fiung “ Tristram Shandy ” 
on the table. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


2S 


CHAPTEE 111. 

IN THE NIGHT. 

“ Seems to me, sir,^^ said Parkin’s friend to Merrydew 
when they met, “ that was very like hedging on your bet.” 

“ I wish to Heaven,” said the parson, “1 had not made 
the bet at all!” 

Mr. Merrydew was silent and thoughtful at the supper- 
table, which awaited his and his friends’ return. He ate 
very sparingly, but pettishly wished he had some seltzer 
with his whisky. Ethel, too, for some reason, was in- 
clined to silence, and looked anxiously at her father. So 
it is not to be wondered at that the chill of constraint soon 
bound the whole table, and that very soon after supper the 
young men proposed to return to their inn. But it does 
seem odd that no one made any allusion — other than that 
already mentioned — to the extraordinary exhibition in 
church; perhaps each of those concerned felt, in his own 
way, ashamed of the part he had played. The young men 
were little more than gone when Merrydew finished his 
whisky and water, and rose and said: 

“ Good night, my dear.” 

“ Going to bed already, father?’ 

“ Yes, 1 am a little out of sorts. Bed will set me up.” 

He was going. Ethel stood fingering the corner of the 
table-cloth. 

“ Father,” she said, with an uncertain voice. 

“ Yes,” said he, turning. “ What is it? Do you want 
to say something to me?” 

“ Only — kiss me, father.” 

“ Humph! that all.” He returned and kissed her, and 
repeated his good night. 

She looked after him with strange, critical eyes. She 
closed the door, and sat down by the fire in an attitude of 
rigid anxiety, with her little hands clasped in her lap, and 
her shapely head the least bit on one side. You would 
have said, had you seen her, she was a dear, sweet girl, but 
likely to be more an incumbrance than a help to a man in 
a sharp crisis. 

“ I wish,” said she, half aloud, “Kate were here;” and 
she looked round her in vague foreboding. 


A REYEREND GENTLEMAET. 


29 


She rose, aod went into the kitchen to send Miriam to 
bed. There was still a bright fire in the open fire-place. 
She put up her foot to the warmth, standing with her hand 
on the mantel-shelf. Miriam stood by her with a bed-room 
candle ready lit. 

“ Has Parry been to see you to-night, Miriam she 
asked, in Welsh, with her eyes on the tire. 

“ Yes, mistress,^^ replied Miriam. 

“ I suppose you’re fond of him, Miriam?” 

“ Oh, yes, mistress, I like him well. He will have the 
little farm when the old Parry dies. ” 

“ 1 suppose he is fond of you?” 

“ Oh, yes, mistress.” 

“ What — what did he say to you when he told you he 
was? Y"ou don’t mind telling me, Miriam.” 

“ Oh, no, mistress. But he did not say anything — not 
a word, that is. He just came into the choir where I was. 
I am ill the Zion choir, of course you know, and Parry had 
never been in the choir; but he sat where he could always 
see me, and then he came into the choir, though he can 
not sing any better than a hog — and then he always walked 
away with me from chapel. And he has given me these 
ear-rings, mistress, and he sent me a valentine this year. 
Oh, Parry loves me very much. ” 

This asseveration was, no doubt, in answer to her mis- 
tress’s raised look of surprise. 

“ When Parry comes to see you, or takes a walk with 
you, what does he talk to you about?” 

“ Oh, Parry, mistress, is not a man to joke and talk. 
He does not say many things; mostly seeds, and potatoes, 
and pigs, mistress.” 

“J wonder,” said Ethel, “whether all men read and 
talk among themselves things they would never talk to 
women about.” 

“ What things, mistress?” Ethel blushed. “ Men,” said 
Miriam, looking fixedly at the candle, “ sometimes say 
things to maidens that, mother says, maidens should not 
listen to.” 

“ Surely,” said Ethel, turning sharply, “ Parry does not 
say such things to you?” 

“He is so wise as not to,” said Miriam; “ if he did, I 
would box him on the ear. I could wish, mistress,” con- 


30 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


tinued she, after a pause, “ you had a young man, so love- 
ly as you are. 

“ Don’t be a goose, Miriam!” said Ethel, with a fine 
blush. “ Come — let us go to bed.” 

Yet, Ethel, when she got to her room, seemed in no 
hurry to go to bed. She kept pausing in her undressing, 
and blankly looking into vacancy. She heard a movement 
in the next room (her father’s), and, saying to herself, 
“ He’s not in bed yet,” with a great show of resolution she 
put a shawl about her and went to the door. But, with 
her hand on the handle, she paused, and doubted. At 
length she collected sufiicieut of her former resolution to 
send her forward; and she went and tapped with trembling 
knuckle at her father’s door. She waited, and tapped 
louder. 

“ Eh? Who’s there?” came in a muffled voice from 
within. 

“It’s me, father.” 

While she stood with her eyes fixed on the brass handle 
of the door, which merely showed like an angry spark of 
fire in the dim light of the tallow dip she carried, she 
heard a creak and a bounce, and she knew her father had 
got out of bed. He opened the door. 

“ Well? What — what? Why aren’t you in bed? Eh! 
Now don’t go off like that, after taking me out of bed, and 
say nothing.” 

“ I’m sorry; I did not think you were in bed, father.” 

She looked in his face, and paused in surprise at the 
change in the look to which she was accustomed. He was 
not handsome at the best of times. He was thin, and 
somewhat below the middle height, and his face was of the 
kind which the vulgar call “ peaked.” His nose was 
ratlier long, and was flattishly pointed, like a spoon-handle, 
as if Nature had originally intended to make it a scooping 
and burrowing organ; his forehead was high and broad; 
his lips were thin, though clearly accented; and his chin, 
though small and narrow, yet, somehow, appeared pointed. 
This sinister physiognomy was usually redeemed from 
plainness by the sweetest smile lips ever made, by the clear 
pallor of the skin, and by the open, liquid brown eyes of a 
child. The smile was now absent, the eyes looked blear, 
and the long wisp of hair, which was usually swept up from 
one side to cover his baldness, fell over his ear, leaving the 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 31 

long, bald crown exposed. She wondered at his look of 
disorder. 

‘‘ What is it? What do you want?^’ he insisted. 

“ I must tell you something, father. I can^t go to sleep 
without telling you. But get into bed, father; you’ll catch 
cold.” 

On his way back to bed he caught sight of his dishevelled 
presentment in the glass. 

“Humph!” grumbled he, stepping to the glass, and 
with a brush sweeping the wisp of hair to its place. 
“ Why couldn’t you leave what you have to say till morn- 
ing, or have said it before we came up to bed?” He got 
between the sheets, found and put on his usual nightcap, 
and said, “ Well, what is it?” 

“You won’t be angry with me,” she pled; “promise 
me, father, you won’t be angry.” She leaned towards 
him, and at length bent to kiss him. 

He let her kiss him, and said, “ You’re like all women; 
you spoil your case beforehand by making too much of it. 
By all this fainting and hesitation, it ought at least to be a 
murder, or a — a breach of another commandment, that’s 
on your mind. I dare say it’s nothing but that you forgot 
to say your prayers, or something of the sort. Come, now; 
1 shall get cross if you keep me waiting.” 

“ Well, I — I didn’t do as you told me to-night. I went 
out to church afterwards, and stood in the porch, and — 
and—” 

“ And heard my sermon! Only a little bit of it! Oh, 
yes!” he laughed, “ as sure as anything’s forbidden, you’ll 
find a chink or keyhole to see it or hear about it. So it 
was you, you monkey, who frightened me by staring in at 
the door of the porch?” 

“ No, father, I did not look in.” 

“You didn’t?” 

“ I didn’t. I was going to tell you. There was a man 
there — a middle-aged gentleman he seemed.” 

A gentleman?” Merrydew rose on his elbow. 

“ Yes; and he said, ‘ Tell your father he may hear some- 
thing of me. I’m the secretary of the Anti-Church So- 
ciety, Clement’s Inn, London.’ And I came away at 
once. ” 

“ He said that! Here’s a fine to-do! Why didn’t the 


32 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


man come into the church and show himself? He must 
have been set to spy and eavesdrop in the porch. 

“ He came into the porch and was going in, but he 
stopped a moment, surprised to find the service so far ad- 
vanced, and then — he heard you reading.'’’ 

“ Came into the porch, you say? Then you were there 
first?” 

“Yes.” 

He sat up. “ Then it was you who got the key from 
the vestry and unlocked the porch? Disobedient hussy!” 
He snatched the nightcap from his head, and was in the act 
to throw it at her, when he flung it to the other side of the 
room. “ Do you know, if a noise is made about this, and 
if anything happens, and we have to go out into the world 
again to seek our fortune — don’t you see it will be all your 
doing, with your prying and listening to things not meant 
for your ears? If you had not unlocked the door the man 
would have found it locked, and would have gone away. 
You are the most exasperating girl. That’s the way 
always; great evils fiow from little sins. Disobedience! — a 
little, wee spot of disobedience, and goodness knows what 
calamities will spring from it, and ruin us all!” 

“ Oh, don’t, father, don’t!” she cried, failing on her 
knees by his bedside, and bursting into tears and sobs. 
“ I am very, very sorry, dear. Don’t call me these things. 
It was very, very wrong of me to go out, 1 know. Oh, 
say you forgive me, dear.” 

“ Just to think, if you had only stayed at home and been 
obedient!” he cried, casting his eyes round in an exasper- 
ated sense of the might-have-been. 

“ Oh, father, don’t! — don’t scold me any more! I know 
it is my fault; and, oh, if anything should happen to you 
fr.om this, I should never forgive myself. But don’t — 
don’t be angry with me any more. I’ll never, never be 
disobedient again, dear.” 

She raised her tearful eyes to him; she put her arm over 
his shoulder and brought her cheek to his breast. He 
looked at her, and relented. He put one arm about her, 
and with the other he stroked her head. His selfish, 
chilly heart went out to the pretty, warm creature he ca- 
ressed, who was a woman and his daughter. His resent- 
ment against her was turned into a mingled rush of new 
delight that he had such a being devoted to his daily needs. 


A EEVEREKD GENTLEMAN. 


33 


and a reckless disregard of the possible event of the situa- 
tion. He was a man, not of passions, but only of emo- 
tions, and even they were of a spasmodic, transitory sort. 

“There, there, my child,"" he murmured. “ l)on"t 
cry, then; don"t cry. Never mind; it"s nothing of conse- 
quence. Why should the middle-aged secretary seem so 
dreadful to us? Pooh! The very worst that can happen 
is to leave this abominable Welsh Slough of Despond, which 
is a rather delightful prospect than not. We can get back 
to London, hey. Poppet?"" 

“ Oh, yes, daddy dear; and we should be near Kate. 
Oh, that would be nice!"" 

“ Yes, it would. By the way, mind you never say a 
word of this to Kate. That"s right. Now it"s time you 
were in bed, to wake fresh and bright in the morning. "" 

Merrydew did everything and felt everything in spasms. 
He was at his best when he was experiencing some new 
sensation, or, failing that, having an old one whisked up 
into a condition resembling newness. He had just had an 
exaggerated spasm of anger against his daughter, which 
was suddenly transformed into a spasm of fondness. The 
fizz and froth of that having passed, he was reminded by 
the mention of Kate that he had another daughter, who 
looked at him clearly, and he found himself seized by an 
acute spasm of apprehension, when he was left alone in the 
dark. 

In that wide review of circumstances, past and present, 
induced by a horizontal position, and the absence of light 
and sleep, Merrydew found himself sinking more and more 
into despondence. The character of a man of fifty, do 
what he will, is set and brittle, like his bones; if he at- 
tempts a reckless youthful freak, and comes to grief in it, 
he cannot pick himself up with the ease and buoyancy of 
youth. Merrydew was too worldly-wise, too conversant 
with the chances and ills of life, to be able to lay by his 
unfortunate prank in his memory and think no more about 
it. He could not really delude himself into the conviction 
that nothing serious would come of it, and for his very at- 
tempt at delusion, he now saw all too clearly, and felt in 
anticipation all too keenly, the calamities that might ensue. 
Now that he was almost certain of being turned out of it, 
his Welsh parish seemed a paradise; and that he should 
have brought himself to this by a reckless audacity worthy 


34 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


only of a lad of twenty! But by fifty, a man has got quite 
tired of calling himself a fool and feeling the better for it; 
and of encouraging himself by the thought that Providence 
will be his friend because he regrets having made a mis- 
take. Merrydew set himself to consider what provision 
might be made against the almost certain event of his hav- 
ing to surrender his living. Most men seem to be agreed 
that the best provision for all worldly emergencies is Cash, 
and this conclusion Merrydew attained very promptly. 
But how was Cash to be obtained? He thought of his 
daughter Kate^s salary, and almost immediately dismissed 
the thought, not from any scruple about appropriating 
such moneys, small as they were, but because he had 
already “borrowed^' what he could. The wild thought 
of marrying Mrs. Evans presented itself for a moment’s 
inspection, but only for a moment’s. There was one glit- 
tering vision which danced before his eyes, but which for 
some time failed to fix his attention, because it seemed 
almost impossible to realize it — Jack Parkin’s money, in 
presently and in in futuro. If he could only get the 
handling of some of that! And why should he not? Jack 
Parkin had already lost ten i)Ounds to him, and he might 
manage to make.that twenty times more. 


CHAPTER IV. 

THE parson’s MONDAY. 

Next day Merrydew went to The Turk’s Head, and 
found, after inquiry, which he knew how to manage, that 
a middle-aged gentleman had arrived the morning before 
from “ over the mountain ” and had departed that morn- 
ing early to catch the train from Oswestry. Had Merry- 
dew intended to ask the middle-aged gentleman to hold his 
tongue about the singular sermon of the evening before? 
If he had any such design it was now, of course, defeated. 
The great Anti-Churchman was doubtless gone to make 
capital out of what he had seen and heard. Well, Merry- 
dew turned lightly about and asked for Mr. Parkin; his 
former pupil filled his vision now more exclusively than 
ever, as the Mammon of Unrighteousness with which it be- 
hoved him to become as friendly as possible. Jack and 
his friend were putting on their big boots to go fishing, and 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 35 

Merrydew at once proposed to go with them; he had noth- 
ing on earth do, and he wanted society. 

“ A parson,’" said he, “ is so far like a cobbler that, after 
a spell of patching soles, he wants to fling a loose leg. 
What about lunch? You must let me order some.” 

“ It’s awfully jolly of you,” said both; and they really 
looked as if they considered him the kindest and most 
sociable creature. 

As he tramped off with them and Parry to the fishing- 
ground, he became more and more buoyant with the hope 
of doing what he would with Jack Parkin. He would not 
try to borrow money of the young man, because he proba- 
bly would not get it; he would coax the gold from his 
pocket; he would play him for it. It was true that the 
other evening the young man had astonished him by win- 
ning his small stock of money, but that, he declared to him- 
self, was by “ a fluke — the brilliant kind of fluke a be- 
ginner at cards often makes.” In the meantime he would 
do his utmost to gain his friendly regard and conbdeiice. 
lie flattered himself as he thought of this, and gave a 
backward glance at his conduct, that the small incident of 
his ordering lunch would conspire to that end. 

So, as they trudged along, he drew the young men’s 
thoughts from the ” gentle craft,” and made them laugh 
with his jokes, his reminiscences, and his Eabelaisian 
stories. The morning was bright, and gave little promise 
of good fishing, so they lingered on the way and were slow 
to begin; till old Parry satirically asked, “Was they 
corned just for to see the watter running?” When the 
sport was really started from a well-chosen pool, Merrydew 
followed Jack up the river, carrying his book of flies, and 
regaling him whenever he came to the bank with another 
good thing, till the angler in Jack was thoroughly demor- 
alised, and old Parry stood by scowling and swearing be- 
hind iris teeth. At length he thought it prudent to desist 
for the time from the course he was pursuing. By-and-bye 
it was time for lunch, at which he said little himself, but 
laughed a good deal at the droll things the young men 
served out to him in return for his many good stories. 
After lunch, being drowsy with meat aiid wine, and their 
attention being still occupied with such matters as they 
had been talking of, angling was resumed with little inter- 
est; and soon they turned homeward without a fin. 


30 


A REVEREND GENTLEJrAN. 


Merrydevv had earnest of his reward for the day’s distrac- 
tions in hearing Jack exclaim: “ Confound this fishing! 
What’s the good of waJing about swishing this rod on a 
February day? George here recommended it as the finest 
fun at this time of year; but I’ll be hanged if I’ll stick to 
it, George. It’s the worst fishing 1 ever had.” 

“ The fishing’s all right,” said George, “ it’s the fisher 
that’s gone wrong. ” 

“ Well, perhaps it is. I was never so fond of holding a 
rod as you. ” 

“ Well, now,” said Merrydew, “ now that you’ve got 
me to dissipate the best part of my day upon you, you 
must help me to spend the fag-end of it. I’ll do what you 
like — be as merry as you like. You know the mood I’m 
in: I’d like to do all the things that good people would cry 
fie upon. Oh, yes, and I’m not such an old fellow neither; 
and I’m sick of my two years’ temperance and stagnation 
in this AVelsh wilderness — as sick as a monk of his con- 
vent. You must come in with me to my shanty, and we’ll 
make it as gay as we can.” 

To secure the young men as guests, he insisted that old 
Parry should go on to the inn with their fishing-tackle and 
a countermand of dinner, and return with the shoes and 
socks for which they had arranged to exchange their hose 
and fishing-boots. 

Ethel received them with glad surprise, and warm with 
churning the weekly butter. Miriam, she explained, turn- 
ing down her sleeves over her round, white arms, usually 
churned, but she likeJ to have a hand in the butter-mak- 
ing herself. 

“ And a nice hand you have, my dear,” said Merrydew; 
“ I mean a nice, cool hand with butter.” 

Jack insisted upon going and assisting in the process, 
and he tramped off behind the radiant girl into the little 
dairy, where Miriam was now turning in a small barrel- 
churn the scanty yield of two raw-boned cows. George 
was looking after Jack, as if with a mind to follow him, 
when Merrydew said: 

“ We may as well go into the kitchen and sit down. 
I’m as tired as it’s comfortable to be. You’d better pull 
your boots off before they get dried in the heat of the fire; 
here’s a pair of slippers till Parry comes with your shoes. 
I wish 1 could offer to put you both up here; but it’s of no 


A HeVEHEND aEKTEEMAK. 


ar 

use wishing. You would scarcely believe 1 liaveu^t a spare 
room. ouldn’fc you like to smoke? Light your pipe, by 
all means. You Ye an old. friend of Jack Parking, I sup- 
pose?^; ^ 

“ WeYe been friends since ever his father became a 
neighbor of ours — my father is the vicar, you know — and 
we’ve been chums since ever he fell in love with my sister 
Nell; he’s engaged to her now.” 

“ Oh, engaged, is he?” 

“ Yes; and going to be married in the autumn. That’s 
how it is we’re here,” said George, with a smile, evidently 
intended to be communicative. 

“ I see,” said Merrydew. 

“Jack, you know,” continued George, “was going it 
rather strong at Cambridge— betting, and all that; he was 
sent down, and his governor was awful upon him — oh, he 
was; talked religion to him — you know old Parkin has got 
fearfully religious lately, more religious than ever.” 

“ And stingier, I suppose.” 

“ Yes. He told him he would come to beggary.” 

“Go to the demnition bow-wows, as Mautalini says,” 
said Merrydew. 

“ Yes,” assented George, without understanding. “ Jack 
was sulky for awhile, and he talked to me about things, 
and 1 proposed that we should come away here out of the 
way of everything, till the old governor had time to cool 
down; I knew the old man would let him go away with 
me; he thinks me, you know” — and a shrewd twinkle 
passed across the simple young fellow’s eye — “ a steady 
sort of file; but 1 like a bit of fun in a fair sort of way. ” 

“ Of course, of course,” said Merrydew, pondering bis 
engaging prattle. “And that was how you came here? 
And how long do you intend to stay?” 

“ Oh, about a fortnight.” 

George Cardigan had, of course, no notion of the mo- 
mentousness to the parson of the news he had communi- 
cated, and he prattled steadily on and on, like an old leak 
that has been incautiously rubbed open. Merrydew seemed 
to listen, and said “ Yes,” or “ No,” but he knew nothing 
more of what he said than what I have recorded. He was 
in a curious stew of thought, now hot and now cold. For 
if Jack were in disgrace with his father, v/hat command of 
money would he have? He ended characteristically, with 


38 


A RETEKEND GENTIEMAK. 


a peevish resentment against the ingenious prattler for not 
having told him these things sooner. 

“ Wouldn’t have guessed, Cardigan,” said he, snappish- 
ly, “ that you had such a fund of talk; you’ve been as 
mum as a bottle until now.” 

“ Yes,” said George, simply, “ I’m not much of a talker 
till I know people.” 

“ I wish, then,” said Merrydew, ‘‘ you had known me on 
Saturday night. I have all this tiiue been without the 
pleasure of your conversation.” 

He returned to a better temper when he saw the half- 
conscious looks with which Jack and Ethel came into the 
kitchen, the latter carrying some newly made butter. 

Where have you been?” said George. 

“ Learning to make butter,” said Jack, without looking 
at him; “ I think I could make it now to anybody’s satis- 
faction.” 

“ I think you have a pretty cool hand, too,” said Merry- 
dew; upon which Jack glanced quickly at him. 

“ Oh,” exclaimed the parson, “ I mean nothing wrong.” 


CHAPTER V. 

THE PARSOH MAKES PUKCF. 

After tea (which Merrydew apologized for offering in- 
■stead of dinner, while Jack protested himself as fond of 
tea as a washerwoman)— after tea, Merrydew rutiled him- 
self, and demanded what was to be done, with the reckless 
air of a man who was resolved to make a night of it, and 
to lose no time in beginning the noctification. 

“ We’re not very lively, are wer” said he. “ Cardigan, 
haven’t you some jolly song you can sing while 1 make 
some punch?” 

George glanced awkwardly at Ethel, and said, “Per- 
haps you don’t know the accompaniment?” 

“ Of what?” asked the young lady. 

“Willie brewed a peck o’‘maut;” at which they all 
laughed, except George, who wondered. 

Fortunately Ethel knew the accompaniment. While the 
song was being sung, Merrydew jovially hummed the air, 
and prepared his i)unch. While the last stanza was sung, 
he joined lustily in the protestation of the chorus that 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


39 


there was “ just a drappie in his e’e/^ and was so pleased 
with his performance, that he demanded its repetition “ all 
together.^' They were thus recklessly declaring that “ the 
cock may craw, the day may daw,’^ when a knock was 
heard at the outer door — a loud, impatient knock, as of 
one who had knocked before. Merrydew stopped at once, 
and uttered an involuntary “ Hush!^’ of such alarm, that 
silence at once supervened. There was no immediate 
reason for this alarm, except the chronic apprehensiveness 
with which the parson was afflicted, augmented now by the 
foreboding that something was sure to come, and soon, of 
his last night’s escapade. Affrighted fancy, according to 
its habit, outran all posts and even the telegraph, and set 
down already at his door the indignant Bishop or his chap- 
lain to listen to a fresh breach of clerical decorum. 

“ What’s that Miriam about?’^ he exclaimed testily to 
his daughter. “Just see, will you?” 

It was shorter work for Ethel to go to the door herself. 
She returned in a second or two, and in reply to her fa- 
ther’s anxious look, smiled, and handed Jack Parkin a let- 
ter, saying old Parry had brought it from the post-office, 
where he found it waiting to be called for, and that he was 
now waiting for Jack’s acknowledgment of the service 
rendered. Jack prudently opened the letter first, and then 
estimated Parry’s service at a shilling, which sum Ethel 
took to the door. 

“ From the governor,” said Jack, beaming round. 
“ After he’s been out of sorts with me he always makes it 
up in a handsome sort of way; sends a check for a good 
figure commonly. This time he has sent a check for me 
to fill in as I like, and some loose notes as well. I suppose 
he thinks it will be difficult to get a check cashed here. 
By the way, that reminds me,” said he, turning to Merry- 
dew more particularly, “ I owe you that bet about last 
night.” And Merrydew’s eye and ear were regaled with 
the sight and sound of two crisp bank notes, which he folded 
and put in his waistcoat pocket. 

“ You shall have the chance of getting it back from me 
in a little,” said he, inspired by . fresh resolution at the 
thought of so much money being near him; the check 
would be filled in for a fair round sum, to judge from 
Jack’s good spirits. “ Ethel, my love, if you can prepare 
us a toothsome bit of supper, and a fig for all the bishops. 


40 


A EEVEEEl^D GENTLEMAN. 


a?id courts, and ecclesiastical powers of Europe, begad 
(Exit Ethel.) “ Now, my dear boys, we'll put ‘ adrappie 
in our e'e.' Thanks, thanks " (to George, who had shyly 
handed over the amount of his Sunday's bet). “ And 
we'll be as merry as sodgers. Look at me; 1 don't know 
but that I may be cast on the wide world to-morrow, with 
a pair of lovely daughters depending on me, and yet I 
don't pucker my brows and look pale with care. Life is 
the easiest affair when you find the knack of getting about 
it. Most people nowadays creep thro' life, or perhaps it 
would be better to say they fly along the middle of the high 
road in mortal terror of the bogies that may be hanging 
about the corners of the bye-roads. Take my advice, you 
boys, and don't be afraid of going down bye-ways, and see- 
ing what is to be seen. Look at the Greeks and Homans," 
exclaimed the seducer, his countenance shining with enthu- 
siasm, and with the steam of his punch, were they afraid 
of life? Look at Englishmen in their heroic days, before 
these molley-coddley, toast-and- water times. Were they 
afraid to live? No! These were men, and were afraid of 
nothing. They dared to know everything life had to show 
them, and so they were the greatest wits, the most com- 
prehensive statesmen, and the bravest soldiers in the world. 
Shade of Fox! they say the greatest statesmen of our de- 
generate day is a person who goes to church three times on 
Sunday, and vrho often reads the lessons! My advice to 
young men is — Live your own life thoroughly and you'll be 
truly great." 

The parson was now seen to some advantage as a 
preacher: for he was uttering the sincere belief of the mo- 
ment, which was the outcome of the irregular practice of a 
life. The plausible discourse manifestly caught the ear 
and humor of Jack Parkin, -as it had been intended it 
should. 

“ Look at me again," continued Merrydew, ladling out 
fresh glasses of punch all round; “ you see a man appar- 
ently of forty years of age — ' ' 

“ Fifty, Merrydew, fifty," cried Jack. 

“ W^ell, say fifty. Fm an example of the rejuvenescent 
effect of a well-spent life. I've seen in my time more 
things than many men; I've been in corners— as I am now 
—where many men would have thought the end was come, 
but I've always turned 'em. I've lived two or three lives, 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


41 


I may say, and yet I now feel younger than 1 felt at three- 
and-tweiity; and I expect to live another life or two yet, 
begad 

“ Will you make a fresh start with a widow, Mr. Merry- 
dew?^^ asked George Cardigan. 

“ No matrimony. Come, let us drink a good drink to 
our better acquaintance with life."^ 

He drank off his glass with so reckless a toss that he fell 
into a stiff fit of coughing, which left him weak and pant- 
ing, and with tears in his eyes; a queer commentary on the 
rejuvenescent effects of his past life. He sat quite still for 
a few seconds, watching Parking’s restless expression of 
face. “ Hang it,"*^ exclaimed Jack at length, ‘‘I must 
have some fun with all this money. 

“ If you were only in London, said Merrydew, when 
he had recovered breath, “ you might get a good deal of 
fun out of it. But here you can^’t do much with money — 
with extra money, I mean; you can give it away, or throw 
it into the Welsh mud. You might, of course, lay out 
money as the Californian diggers did, in bets on the jump- 
ing of two frogs, or on the pace of two bugs.^^ 

“ Or,^^ said Jack, “ on the reading of a sermon.’^ 

“ Or, as you say. By the way,^'’ said Merrydew, sitting 
up, “ you owe me a revenge for Saturday night. 1 have 
two or three packs of cards about. 

“ My father,^’ said Cardigan, with touching relevancy, 
“ w^on’t allow a card in the house. 

“ Ah,’’ said Merrydew, “ you see your father has a son.” 

‘‘ Will you play dominoes with me, Mr. Cardigan?” 
asked Ethel. 

“ Why can’t we all play at dominoes?” said Jack. 

Duty before pleasure, my boy,” said Merrydew. 
“ Settle my business first.” 

“ All right,” said Jack, come along,” 

They played before and after supper, and the dominoes 
were left entirely to Ethel and George. Ethel went to 
bed, and George stretched himself in the easy-chair and 
went to sleep, and still they played on. It was nearly mid- 
night when Merrydew rose with a serene countenance; he 
had been winning, not at a great pace, but with sufficient 
facility to make him confident that the skill for which he 
had once been rather famous had not deserted him. 


43 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


“ You must give me my revenge to-morrow night/^ said 
Parkin, looking thoughtfully at the scattered cards. 

“ To be sure, my boy, to be sure,"" said Merrydew. 
“But let me ask you one thing: don’t let my daughter 
know there"s money involved."" 


CHAPTER VI. 

MERRYDEW SEES CLEARLY. 

Merrydew imagined, after that first comparative suc- 
cess, that he was about to fill his pockets with the Parkin 
money without much trouble or opposition from Jack, but 
the result fell far short of his expectation. When the 
young man acquired the knack of ecarte, and of the new 
game of euchre with its right and left bower, he showed 
himself more adroit than his master. Eight after night, 
either at the parsonage or at the inn, it took all Merrydew"s 
time and attention to escape defeat, but still he bravely 
played on in hopes that the luck would turn. The whole 
week he was thus so engrossed that he saw nothing of an- 
other game that was being played close to him. But for 
his preoccupatHui his usually sharp eyes would have discov- 
ered that Jack Parkin was making love to Ethel as ardently 
and assiduously as opportunity permitted. It was the 
Wednesday of the following week, however, before the par- 
son"s eyes so clearly perceived this as to make an intelli- 
gent report to his brain. 

An excursion to the top of the mountain had been 
arranged for the Wednesday, and on their return at the 
close of the day they were all to go to dinner at The Turk"s 
Head. 

Wednesday broke bravely bright, though cold, and for a 
wonder the parson was astir betimes, helping his daughter 
to make ready for the outing. She was in the cheerfullest 
of spirits; her doleful apprehension of some catastrophe 
which that terrible Sunday night had brought had died 
away, since her father had said nothing more about it, and 
seemed unaffected by it; and the misgiving which had then 
arisen about lovers in general had yielded and dissolved 
under the gentle attentions and the manifest fondness of 
one lover in particular. To-day would all be spent in his 
company! 

But in the meantime there were sandwiches to be cut. 


A REVEREKD GEJSTLEAIAN'. 


43 


and ciirions flasks and bottles to be prepared, and all to be 
packed into basket and satchel ; and then there were boots, 
and dresses, and frillings, and wraps to be seen to. Be- 
tween nine and ten the two young men appeared, with old 
Parry, who was to act as guide. Jack Parkin was inclined 
to rebel against the presence of the taciturn and unintelli- 
gible Welshman, and wished to send him back, declaring 
they did not want a guide to the top of a hillock like Moel 
Hebog. Thus encouraged, Eihel entered her protest; she 
could lead them herself; she had been up a dozen times. 
But the parson and George Cardigan maintained it was 
safer and more satisfactory to have a steady old hand like 
Parry to guide them, who would not seek to take them by 
perilous short cuts, along which the loss of both life and 
lunch would be risked. 

“ Never mind,’" whispered Ethel to Jack; “ I’ll take 
you the short way; it’s nicer than the other, and we shall 
be there before them.” 

So they set out. When the ascent of the mountain 
began, Merrydew found that Parkin and his daughter were 
taking their own way, carrying with them all the provisions. 

“ We prefer to walk in the footsteps of sage experience,” 
said he to George, taking his arm with a smile. And thus 
he continued with lively remark, and good story, to relieve 
the tedium of the way for the young man. Could he have 
guessed how heartily he was getting himself disliked by the 
pure-minded, honest Yorkshire lad, and that the pace at 
which George swufig along, and dragged him after, was 
urged by this dislike, and not, as he fondly imagined, by 
the sprightliness and “ go” of his conversation, he would 
have sat down on the sodden hillside in disconsolate amaze- 
ment. As it was, they walked little in the footsteps of 
Sage Experience; for Sage Experience was, for the most 
jmrt, toiling painfully behind, while they paused now and 
then, and asked in airy confidence whether they were not 
going the right way. 

T&y rejoined Jack and Ethel on the top. There was a 
little hut in which they took shelter from the stiff cold 
breeze, and where they enjoyed what George, with a 
Malaprop flash of wit, called the “ cold collection.” They 
rambled about and admired the clear, wide view of the sur- 
rounding country, and of the sea glistening in the far dis- 
tance, and then they began their descent. Jack and Ethel 


44 


A EEVEKEKD GENTLEMAN. 


still kept very much together, and the parson entertained 
George. They reached The Turk^s Head tolerably tired 
(Merrydew was exceedingly tired, but he would not for the 
world say so), with excellent appetites, and with spirits 
which were all the brisker because of the hope they had of 
sitting down to a good dinner. 

After dinner came the crisis for Merrydew. 

“ 1 must have a game with you. Jack, my boy,^^ he 
said. “ I canT be content to remain beaten, as you have 
beaten me the last two nights, on my own ground, begad. 
No, I never could have believed it. And you only learned 
the game the other night. Ton my word, it^s astonishing. 

“ It"s the drilling in mathematics you used to give me/^ 
said Jack, complacently, and with a glance at Ethel, who 
looked reproachfully at him and her father. “ Well,'^ said 
Jack, “ just one game or two.’^ 

“ One game or two!’^ said Merrydew, “ I must have a 
full and sufficient revenge, begad. 

“ Certainly, sir,^^ said Jack, with a laugh; “but that 
may not take long. 

The second card Jack played made the parson sit up and 
exclaim, “ This won’t do!” Anxiously regarding Jack’s 
face, he played off one of his pet tricks; Jack received it 
with a light, careless laugh, and foiled it. This was the 
beginning of a speedy rout all along his line. In consider- 
ably less than an hour the parson was miserably beaten 
again. 

“Good Gad!” he exclaimed, throwing himself back in 
his chair. “ How the dickens do you do it. Parkin? 1 
was never so beaten in all my life before! In other days I 
was reckoned a player.” And nodding his head in amaze- 
ment, he picked up one or two of the cards he had thrown 
down, as if to discover whether their look and substance were 
different from what they had been “ in other days.” 

“ I soon pick up a thing of this sort,” said Jack, lightly. 

“ Eeally, ’pon my word, you seem to me to have quite a 
genius for things of this sort!” 

Ethel turned from her game at cribbage with George 
Cardigan on hearing these words, and looked from her fa- 
ther to Jack in anxious surprise. Jack saw the look. 

“ Thank you,” said he; “ but I still think, Mr. Merry- 
dew, it’s a case of applied mathematics, or mathematics 
applied,” 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


45 


Mr. Merrydew’s eyes ached sometimes of an evening in 
the lamplight, so sometimes, as now, he closed them as he 
sat back in his chair. The young people saw him thus, and 
thought he was asleep. But Mr. Merrydew was as wide- 
awake as ever he had been, perhaps wider than ever. He 
had abandoned all hope of winning money by play, and as 
he sat musing on other ways and means, now and then 
raising his eyelids to get a glimpse of his daughter and the 
two young men talking and laughing over a sociable game, 
he began to perceive, with something like jealousy at first, 
the mutual understanding and hope expressed by the look 
and tone of Ethel and Jack. As he looked, there came 
upon him a consciousness of the gulf fixed between him 
and them, which no middle-aged vivacity, no juvenility of 
sentiment, could sufficiently bridge. They enjoyed them- 
selves better, more heartily, without liim; even that 
awkward booby, George, had a certain simple grace of 
manner and speech which were wholly wanting when he 
was felt to be by. It was evident that they only put up 
with him; he appeared to them, doubtless, as a ridiculous 
old fellow who put on youthful and audacious airs to con- 
ceal the satiety and feebleness which, it is thought, increas- 
ing age must bring, with about as much success as he hid 
his baldness with the side-wisp of hair swept over his crown. 
They could not understand that to some people life is ever 
fresh and promising. The fools! Why should not life be 
as full of interest and desire to him as to them? Was not 
his capacity for enjoyment as great as theirs? — yes, greater; 
for had he not trained his faculties to an appreciation of 
all life, which it would take these hobby-de-hoys many 
years to acquire? — if they could ever acquire it. But here 
was the irony of Fate, that to them inclined all the chances 
of enjoyment. Look at that Parkin! (Mr. Merrydew^s 
eyes were now set open, with an angry, greedy glitter, upon 
that figure which during the last few days had more and 
more filled his thought and imagination as representative 
of the means of enjoyment). What had he done or en- 
dured that Fortune should shower so many advantages into 
his hat? ‘‘ I must — I shall go shares, was his thought. 
Yet what hope was there of that, when all the result of his 
elforts up till now — efforts in which he had not conceived 
he could have been baffled, especially by such a mere whip- 
ster — all the result to himself was that he had lost every 


46 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


farthing of cash, and become indebted he could not say how 
much? For his losses had come upon him so quickly he 
could scarcely keep count or make note of them! Perhaps 
his efforts had not had sufficient variety; yet he had been in 
the habit of reckoning himself versatile in resource. Some- 
thing he must do; but what? 

“ Ah!’' he suddenly said to himself, “ why did 1 not 
think of that before? She must marry him, and then he 
will be at my command." 

His daughter happened just then to turn to look at him. 
Seeing his set stare, she exclaimed, rising hurriedly, “ Fa- 
ther, are you not well, dear?" 

“ Eh?" said he, recovering his gay, careless-seeming 
self, “ I’m all right, my dear, all right. I was just rest- 
ing a little. Well, what have you been doing?" 

“ Oh," cried George Cardigan, “ we’re in the middle of 
a very jolly game; don’t interrupt us, please, Mr. Merry- 
dew; go on with your nap. Come along. Miss Ethel." 

Merrydew felt he turned rather red; Ethel looked re- 
proachfully at George; Jack laughed; and George, glancing 
from one to another, felt he had somehow blundered. 

“You take my hand, dear," said Ethel, offering her 
cards to her father. 

“ No, no," said he; “ go on with your game, my child. 
But," said he, looking at his watch, “ if you don’t mind, 
we’ll go home presently, when your game’s done." 


CHAPTER VII. 

TWO APPEALS. 

Perhaps it was the walk through the clear night air 
that made Mr. Merrydew wakeful, but, however it was, 
wakeful he found himself to be when he got home. He 
paced the room; Ethel went to bed; he still paced the room. 
Then he put the shade on the lamp, and sat down to write. 
As he paused a moment, sucking the feather of his quill, 
did some touch of generous shame, the least qualm of con- 
science, visit him because of what he was about to do? 

His daughter Kate, ever since her mother’s death, when 
she was a tall slip of twelve, had ministered to his wants. 
She had managed his house in his two attempts at school- 
keeping; she had stuck to^ her studies under all kinds of 
difficulties and discouragements, even from her father, that 


A llEVEREND 


47 


she might be able to earn her living as a governess, and 
relieve her indulgent but unfortunate parent of her charges; 
and she had been a mother to her sister. When he mi- 
grated to Wales, she had gone into the house of Alderman 
Cholmley, in Hornsey, to teach the young Misses the use 
of their native language, at a salary of £60 a year. All of 
this money he had received, on some pretence or other; 
every shilling he had received as regularly as the instal- 
ments of salary had been paid, while Kate depended even 
for pocket-money on private gifts. 

It was now little more than mid-quarter, yet here he was 
set down to beg of his daughter anew, with no more regret 
than if she were his debtor; indeed he felt something like 
resentment that the largest sum he could ask for was so 
small. This is the letter he wrote: 

“ My dear Kate, — I have no doubt that, with the mild 
weather we have been enjoying, our dear London is begin- 
ning to look gay and Spring-like — not so much, perhaps, on 
your chilly northern side, as on the west and south. You 
remember I used to say that the difference of temperature 
between the Surrey hills and the Highgate hills was about 
the same as the difference between France and England. 
Ah, if I were only again out of this ancient British wilder- 
ness, our lost position in the world might be retrieved, you 
and your sister might move in such society as you are in 
every way fitted to adorn, and gain that wide acquaintance 
with life and the world, without which woman and man 
both are no better than blind Bartimeus. I have always 
felt convinced that 1 was not to be left forever to waste my 
faculties on these barbarians, but I did not anticipate that 
deliverance from this lot was to appear in the way it has 
come. It is a coincidence which good people (you know I 
have no pretension to be very good) would call providential, 
that at the same time as I hear of the probability of my 
small living being taken away from me, and given to one 
who has greater claims on the patron — at that very time 
an old friend and pupil should turn up, and should show, 
from the very first moment of his appearance, that he was 
deeply smitten with our Ethel. His name is Jack Parkin 
— you remember him, of course, a handsome boy of seven- 
teen. He arrived here last Friday for a fortnight's fishing, 
with a friend. He has left Cambridge, and is about to set- 


48 


A REVEREKD GENTLEMAK". 


tie down as a country gentleman on his father^s estate in 
Yorkshire. He is his father's ouly child, and will inherit 
everything — the share in the Bradford concern and all. 
Ethel and he are really, I think, very much taken with 
each other; it will be a very suitable match, and 1 think it 
can be brought about. I wish you were with us to enjoy 
this sudden and almost — for us — overwhelming influx of 
society, and to help us to entertain it. It is rather a tax 
upon us with our very slender resources, made more slen- 
der still by the truculent demand of that London tailor, 
for the remaining £10 of his bill, which 1 was compelled to 
satisfy, since he threatened County Court proceedings. 1 
have therefore thought, my dear, kind girl, that to help 
us through this promising crisis a little, you might get the 
Alderman to advance you the very small sum which he pays 
you quarterly for your valuable services. My dear, in con- 
clusion, let me give you a word of advice. Resolve never 
to be poor — never to live in poverty. Dura pa%ipertas 
(you remember your Latin) hardens, narrows, and embit- 
ters the whole of life. Poverty is the destruction of life, 
as says the preacher; it is annihilation. Therefore, as I 
say, resolve never to be poor. I am glad to think that as 
yet 1 have been able to keep you out of this sordid, bitter 
life; you enjoy luxury; you need have no thought for the 
morrow; you’re among your equals. Do your utmost to 
retain your position, and to improve it. I remember your 
telling me about the son of the Cholmley house, that he is 
very nice, and a promising young barrister; might not 
something be done with him? a handsome, clever girl like 
you ought to marry well; it would be almost a disgrace to 
your talent and opportunity if you did not. Verhum sap. 

“ Ever your loving father, 

“William Merrtdew.” 

This letter being re-read and addressed, and put in his 
pocket, he went to bed. 

In the morning, after breakfast, he was preparing to set 
out to post his letter, in good spirits. 

“ Shall you be back to dinner, father?” asked Ethel. 

“ To dinner, or lunch— which should we say, my girl? 
I shall be back,” said he, with a smile, “ and I think I 
shall bring a young gentleman with me. Do you like that, 
hey?” 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


49 


“ It will be pleasant/’ said she, blushing and turning a 
cup upside down, “ after sitting at dinner for two years all 
by ourselves.” 

“ Ah, 1 thought so, you and Jack have resumed your old 
friendship, and pushed it on till— eh? Has Jack said any- 
thing to you?” he asked, laying his hand on her shoulder. 

She suddenly seized her father’s hand, and hid her face 
against the skirt of his coat. 

“ I don’t know,” she murmured. “ Don’t, please, ask 
me questions of that sort.” 

He said nothing, but he looked down at the well-shaped 
head, with its wealth of fair hair gathered closely about it 
(while he stroked it, half absently), at the sweet, white 
neck curving out to the shoulders, and at the other ravish- 
ing lines of beauty which descended thence, and, as he 
looked, a fresh impulse came upon him to strengthen his 
somewhat uncertain desire and resolution to bring Jack 
into his family. Nothing I can think of so well indicates 
the state of feeling into which he was whisked, as an old 
form of words: “ He rejoiced in ” his daughter. Few of 
us ever note at their value the things that lie next to us; to 
some, a moment of clear-seeing comes now and then with 
a flash of revelation. To Merrydew one such moment had 
already come, when, on Jack Parkin’s arrival, he had dis- 
covered his daughter was a woman; now came another, 
when he thoroughly perceived for the first time what a rich 
possession her beauty was, and he felt how very desirable 
she must appear to the warm blood of three-and-twenty, 
how much more desirable than anything else on earth or in 
heaven. And this treasure was his to make the most of! 
Why had he not seen before that this was the card to win 
with?” 

“ You siren,” he said, raising her head; “ I believe 
you’ve fairly entangled Jack. Gad! you must have. I 
know if 1 were a young fellow you’d have led me captive 
by now. You like him — hey? — don’t you? Now, come, 
my dear, tell me what he has said to you.” 

“ 1 don’t know,” she repeated. “ I mean I don’t un- 
derstand him. Please don’t be cross with me, father, but 
I caj/t bear not to tell you everything. I am afraid I said 
things to him I should not have said.” 

“ Fh?” 

“ Don’t be cross. I told him I was dreadfully tired of 


50 


A KEVEItENt) OENTLEMAN. 


being here; that when 1 looked round when I was doing 
things in the kitchen or anywhere, I felt almost sick of 
going on living/' she declared, passionately. “ I felt 
ready to sit down and cry, and that I did sometimes. " 

“ Well, my child," said Merrydew, very quietly, “ per- 
haps that's not to be wondered at, though you need not 
have mentioned the kitchen. " 

“ But, father," said she, “ it's true; 1 am about so much 
with Miriam, doing things, that I often feel as if 1 were 
becoming no better than a kitchen-maid, and there doesn't 
seem any ‘chance of our ever getting out of this. And that 
was what 1 told him." 

“ And what did he say?" 

“ He said I need not stay here with — with you any 
longer, to — to drudge about. I can't help it, father; that's 
what he said. " 

“Well?" 

“ And he said if 1 went away with him we should go to 
London and live in a nice house, and have things even 
nicer than we used to have at Hampstead." 

“ I see. Now listen to me a little, my girl." And 
Merrydew sat down. “ Jack, I am certain, is very much 
in love with you, but 1 have found out from his friend, 
George, that his father wants him to marry George’s sister." 

“ Oh, he has never told me that." 

“ Naturally, he has not. Jack has so often offended his 
father, and been forgiven, that he is afraid to offend him 
in this. He likes you, but he is afraid to marry you. Do 
you see?" 

“ I won't speak to him again!” 

“ Oh, yes, my dear, you will. Poor fellow; he is caught 
between two fires — his love for you and his fear of his fa- 
ther. A little careful management, and love will have 
him. You must manage him. Oh, yes, you must, you 
easily can; it is, indeed, absolutely necessary you should. 
You wish to leave this; well, it is more than probable we 
shall have to leave this in a pretty summary fashion. 
They must give me six months' notice, but for all that, I 
don't see what I am to do at the end of the time. You 
know what 1 mean. We shall have to leave this very soon, 
all through that confounded business of Sunday night." 

“ Oh, don't say that, fatlxer." 

“ It is true. And what can I do? Where can 1 go? I 


A KEVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 51 

cannot possibly get another living; they would not have an 
old fellow like me in a school, even as an usher. 

“ Poor, dear daddy!^^ 

“ I may, perhaps, get a haggard living by lessons at a 
shilling an hour. But what will you do?’^ 

“ I can teach in a school, or in a family, like Kate, and 
send you my money, as she does."” 

“ That wouldnT amount to niuch,'^ said her father, 
with a snap. “ But you are a good girl, and mean well. 
There is a better way than that, though; Jack loves you, 
and you love Jack, hey? hey? People that love each other 
should get married. 

“ But, father, if — if he doesn’t ask me?” 

“ Make him, make him ask you. A clever, handsome 
girl can always do that.” 

“ I have read in books of girls doing that. But, father, 
you know I’m not clever; and even I, were I so, couldn’t 
manage myself as 1 have read cf girls doing. If it doesn’t 
come of itself, I can’t help it.” 

“ Yes, yes; but you don’t deny you’re good-looking, and 
good-looking people show most cleverness when they do 
nothing, but let their good looks do everything for them. 
Simply do that, and husband, yes, ’gad, husband your 
affection. Appear, you know, rather shy of his company 
than eager for it; make him a little jealous, that’s a fine 
spur to apply to a high-spirited young man ; there’s Cardi- 
gan, play him off upon Jack. Well, well; I won’t say 
more. And perhaps it would spoil the game to lay down 
rules for it. You must let your discretion be your tutor, 
my dear.” 

“ Please, father,” said she, rising through surging 
blushes, and laying her face against the paternal waistcoat, 
“ don’t talk to me like that.” 

“ Well, my dear, never mind me. I suppose girls and 
boys will always insist on finding out the way for them- 
selves. Now I must go.” 


CHAPTER VIII. 

MRS. EVANS SPEAKS. 

Merrydew had just crossed the outer threshold when, 
upon consulting his watch, he calculated that iiis letter 
would bo late for the village post. A clever idea occurred 


52 


A UEVERENi) GENTLEMAN. 


to him, and made him rub his smooth chin, and stroke his 
nose. He might still catch the post by walking to Olwycld 
(a little town about five miles off); his letter would thus 
still reach Kate the next morning, and — 

“ Ethel, my dear,^’ said he, returning into the parlour, 
“ I find 1 cannot be back to lunch, I must walk to Clwydd 
to catch the post; still, you know, you may have company, 
so you had better have something ready. 

Arrived in the village, he looked into the low, dingy 
coffee-room of The Turk^s Head. 

“ Ah, here you are still. Going a-fishing to-day again, 
I suppose. Wish 1 could go with you, but 1 must hurry off 
to Clwydd with an important letter that has missed the 
post here. Tm afraid I sha^nT get back till latish. Eut 
I expect you both at my shanty to-night.’^ 

The two young men laconically thanked him, and he 
went off, thinking: “Now, if he does not go and hang 
about her all day, in spite of whatever that young codfish 
Cardigan may say, he is not in the condition I fancy he is 
in.^' 

The subject of Merrydew’s uncomplimentary epithet 
turned to his friend Jack when they were alone, and said, 
“ Shall you go to-night?'^ 

“ Well, yes, I think so,’^ answered Jack; “it’s rather 
fun.” 

“ 1 thought you liked a good dinner.” 

“ Ido; but dinner by ourselves would bo so confoundedly 
slow. ” 

“ We can ask Merrydew here; I daresay he’d be glad to 
come.” 

“ Of course he would, and run up our bill with cham- 
pagne, and claret, and whisky and seltzers, afterwards, 
over his cards. No, thank you. ” 

“You don’t mean,” said George, looking hard at his 
friend in an attempt to understand the feeling that could 
prompt so ill-conditioned a remark, “ you don’t mean that 
you begrudge the parson his liquor. Jack?” 

“ No,” said Jack, turning rather red, “ of course not. 
Still I don’t care much about asking him here. ” 

“ Do you think really now,” asked George, twisting the 
very short ends of his very early and spring-like moustache, 
“ that Merrydew is as poor as he would make himself out 
to be?” 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


53 


“ Poorer. When 1 was in his school he was always get- 
ting dunned by the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick- 
maker, and I believe he'd be dunned yet if they knew 
where to find him; I don^t suppose they ever got half of 
what he owed them. He had such a way with them they 
could n^t help trusting him, I suppose; and 1 daresay he 
has never known anybody he has not tried to make use of 
— so you had better look out. l^d lay anybody ten to one 
he borrows (‘ convey,' the wise it call)— prigs, that is — the 
bit of money his daughter Kate makes by her teaching in 
London." 

“ The old thief! What a pity the girls haven't got any 
money of their own, ain't it?" 

“ Yes," said Jack. 

Their eyes met and considered each other for a moment. 

“ What sort of girl's Kate?" asked George, glancing at 
his fingers. 

“ Oh — as you've heard — the picture of her sister, but 
colder and more knowing-like. When 1 was at school I 
thought I was in love with her," and the young man 
laughed; “ but I wanted to kiss her once and she slapped 
my face, so there was an end of my being in love. " 

Ah, Ethel's not half-bad, don't you think, Jack?" 

“ I've heard you say that four or five times already, 
George," said Jack; and the two looked at each other as 
young Englishmen only do look when they see each other 
for the first time. 

“ Well, and if 1 have,” retorted George, with a peony 
blush on his honest round face, “that's no reason, is it, 
why you should get your hump up?" 

“ No," said Jack, becoming quite cool, as his friend 
grew rather warm. “ But it may be a reason why you 
shouldn't say it again." 

George burst into a laugh, and they both rose in their 
big boots as they heard old Parry outside enquiring for 
them. 

On their way out they encountered the landlady; Jack 
paused, and told her they would not return to dinner. 

“Good luck to you, sir," said Mrs. Evans, “and 1 
hope we may be hearing more of it in a little while, for if 
you are only here for a fortnight, you must be quick. But 
you're not of the piney, hugger-mugger sort, I can see 


54 


A KEVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


that, bless you, sir, and I daresay you^ve settled it all 
already. 

“ Settled what?’’ Jack would have asked, but that he 
suspected what her answer would be, and* disliked to hear 
it, or to have it heard. He got very red, while George 
stood in blank astonishment. “ You mustn’t talk too 
fast, Mrs. Evans,” said he, brushing past her, and giving 
her a look which he intended to be admonitory, but which 
she seemed to consider merely deprecatory. 

“You must come here, Mr. Parkin,” she called, with a 
laugh, “ after the simminary.^’ 

“ What does she mean?” asked George. “ What is she 
talking about?” 

“ God knows,” answered Jack. “ But it’s of no conse- 
quence; she’s a chattering, fizzling beer-barrel. Parry, 
have you got that confounded fly yet that we are going to 
catch such fish with? What does the ancient Briton say, 
George? You understand something of his language.” 

George was not to be thus diverted from boring his at- 
tention in upon the enigmatical sayings of Mrs. Evans. 
George was stupid, but not so stupid as not to feel that 
Jack’s manner of receiving the landlady’s words was sug- 
gestive of a very quick knowledge of their meaning. What 
could that be? It was not very secretly hidden, especially 
considering the suspicious points that surrounded it, yet 
they had gone some distance — were, indeed, passing the 
parson’s house — before it flashed upon George — “ The par- 
son’s daughter.” Then he thought strange things, and 
looked at his friend Jack, but he held his tongue for the 
present. 

Jack, on his part, was quite unconscious of both the 
thoughts and the look of George; even if he had seen the 
look and guessed the thoughts he would not have noted 
them, for what George might think on any matter was of 
small moment to Jack at any time, smallest of all now, 
when he had a ravishing glimpse of a beautifully-formed 
female figure reaching up to a clothes-line in the parson’s 
kitchen-garden. What was she about? Had she been 
helping Miriam to do the washing? It was Thursday; 
could it be washing-day? Was that why the parson had 
gone to Clwydd, because there would be nothing savoury 
to eat in the middle of tire day? However it was, the par- 
son was gone, and probably would not be back till dusk, 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


55 


and until then his daughter would be alone, or as good as 
alone, for the foolish "Welsh servant-maid was no company. 
This thought, and the kindling glimpse he had had of 
Ethel kept close to his heart all the way to the fishing- 
ground, and for some time after he had begun to whack 
the pools with his line. They stuck so close to his heart, 
and worried it so, that he wound in his line and left the 
river, requesting Parry to tell George, who was at a distant 
pool, that a violent toothache compelled him to return to 
the village. 


CHAPTER IX. 

VIRGINIBUS PUERTSQUE. 

Parkin did not return to the village; he stopped at the 

J mrsonage. His knock was not attended to, so, leaning 
jis fishing-rod against the wall, he opened the door, and 
walked in, and on till he came to the kitchen. As he en- 
tered, he was seen from the farther end, where Ethel and 
Miriam stood wringing a sheet in a cloud of steam from 
the scullery. They paused, stared at him, and then at 
each other. Ethel seemed struck with the impropriety of 
this visit in her father^s absence, and she blushed a very 
becoming colour. 

“ Excuse me,"” said Jack, crossing the flagged floor 
rather noisily in his great boots; 1 hope 1 have not done a 
very rude thing in taking you unawares like this in your 
kitchen. I knocked at the door, but I suppose you did not 
hear me, so I took the liberty of lifting the latch and walk- 
ing in. I have a most excruciating toothache.^'’ And, in- 
deed, he looked pale, and racked with pain, as he ap- 
proached Ethel. “ 1 have been to the fishing, but 1 have 
had to come back.^^ 

“Yes; I know, said Ethel. “1 saw you pass;"’ and 
again she blushed. “ But what can I do for your tooth- 
ache?” 

“ Sorry,” said he, “ if I should put you about in your 
duties. You might let me sit by the kitchen fire, if Pd 
not be in your way.” 

“ Oh, no,” said she, hurriedly pulling down her sleeves, 
“you would not. But there’s a fire in the sitting-room; 
come 'hi there;” and she led the way. “ We should have 
done this washing yesterday,” said she, with a smile. 


50 


A REVEREND GENTLEAIAN. 


He sat down, warmed his handkerchief at the fire, and 
laid his cheek in it. She looked at him anxiously. 

“Try,"" said she, going to the sideboard, “a drop of 
whisky with cotton vyoolj I find that cure me sometimes. 

“ Thank you; I"d rather have the whisky without the 
cotton wool, ril try just what you may call a toothful of 
it."" 

She was about to pour him out a glassful, but, on second 
thoughts, she set down the decanter and glass that he 
might help himself. With considerable show of absorption 
in his pain, he silently poured out a very little, took about 
half of it into his mouth, and appeared to let it flow about 
and into the aching tooth. She re-warmed his handker- 
chief for him. He received it with a long and somewhat 
embarrassing look of gratitude, and laid it again to his 
cheek. She stood near, fingering the table-cloth for some 
moments; then she said that she must see to something, 
but that she would return in a little while. 

When she was gone. Jack flapped out his handkerchief, 
sat up, and laughed quietly to himself. His jubilation was 
so great, that if he had been a fair man he would have 
pirouetted about the room; but atrabilious men are not 
much given to that kind of maiiifestatioji of feeling. He 
poured out more whisky, filled up the glass with water, 
and drank. He repeated this, and again sat back in 
Merrydew"seasy-chair. He closed his eyes and considered. 
His thoughts were of a sort which it is not wise to pry into 
very much; the purest mind is at times visited by such, 
and the impure is at all times infested with them; they are 
pestiferous to all, and deadly to the heart that breeds them. 
How disquieting they were to Jack Parkin may be guessed 
from his quickened, tremulous breathing, from his dry 
lips, which his tongue failed to moisten, and from his oc- 
casional long breath for relief. 

After some time he heard a step, and he lay as if asleep. 
He was almost facing the door. It opened, and Ethel en- 
tered and stood still. He seemed asleep. She glanced be- 
hind her to see that the door was opened for retreat, and 
then she slowly and with beating heart advanced to have 
a good look at him. She loved him, she thought — oh, 
very dearly! — but whether in entire self-surrender and be- 
cause she did not know why, or partly because she found in 
him the possible deliverer from the dreary, sordid life she 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


57 


led, she was too truly a woman to inquire. Yet she took 
this excellent opportunity to peruse his face, to study its 
unconscious expression, and see if it would reveal to her 
why her heart would persist in doubting somewhat the 
beauty and strength of his love. The love that doubts had 
better turn away. But Ethel crept nearer. The usual 
keen, resolute, and avid expression of her lover’s face was 
softened; the eyes, with their too bright, watchful glances 
were hid, the mouth was not too firmly closed, and the 
frown that commonly lingered between the eyebrows was 
smoothed away. Surely this was a face whose strength and 
gentleness and truth she could not but trust and love; — 
love? yet he had not in set words asked for her love. But 
could she doubt what he meant by look and whisper and 
haunting step? While she gazed and considered, a sudden 
pallor passed over his face, like the shadow of a thought, 
his eyelids trembled, and set her heart in a tumultuous flut- 
ter. A gentle smile suffused his face, his lips parted a lit- 
tle, and he murmured a word — “ Darling ” — distinctly. 
Of whom was he thinking? Of herself, or of another? In 
a sudden rush of jealousy, love, and shame, she turned to 
the door, when her hand was seized with a nervous grasp, 
and she knew, without exactly looking, that Jack was rising 
from the chair. The next moment he was by her side, 
putting his arm about her, and saying, in low, intense 
tones — 

“ Don’t run away from me like that.” 

She put his embracing arm away, but still let him hold 
her hand, while she answered, “You don’t want me. Let 
me go away; 1 have the lunch to get ready. You can sit 
down, and think of the person you were dreaming about.” 

“ Did I — name anybody?” 

“Yes,” said she. 

“Then,” said he, again putting his arm about her, 
“ it must have been you, Ethel — darling.” 

She gave him a furtive glance, and then broke away from 
him; there was something — niocking,^at first she thought 
— but, at any rate, something she didliot like in his eye. 

“ You were not thinking of me; you were thinking of 
that girl you’re engaged to.” 

His eyes dropped a moment, and he changed colour. 
“ What girl? I’m engaged to no girl; or, rather, I’ve 
been six years engaged to you. ” 


58 


A IlEVEREKD GEXTEEMAN”. 


“ Oh, that’s nothing. You are engaged now to Mr. 
Cardigan’s sister. Ah, I see, you did not think I should 
find it out.” 

“ No,” said he, looking at her very frankly, “ I did not 
expect you to hear of it, because it does not exist. Don’t 
go away.” lie moved round between her and the door. 
“ My father wants me to be engaged, because he wishes 
me to settle, and her mother wants it, because— I suppose, 
because I’d be a catch.” 

At that word she put her hand to her cheek, and turned 
abruptly to the window. Was not that what her father 
considered Jack — “ a catch?” And Jack disliked this Miss 
Cardigan because her mother angled for him. If he knew 
all he would probably dislike her. How could she bear 
that? How empty, sunless, and hopeless all life would be- 
come. Jack’s touch precipitated feeling. 

“ Oh, Jack!” she cried, turning, falling on his neck with 
an hysteric sob, “don’t think I doubted your love — will 
you? 1 did just for a little, only for a very little.” 

Jack replied with such words and actions as lovers have 
employed any time since the flood to signify their consum- 
ing love for a maiden. Hundreds of story-tellers and play- 
writers have written such scenes, and the majority of man- 
and womankind have enacted them; yet it is strange that 
not one of us at the outset can distinguish the false love 
from the true. Much protestation is«thought by some to 
be a token of the love that is shallow and insincere, and I 
daresay it frequently is; yet the man who should protest 
not at all would be thought a very cold and awkward lover. 
Jack Parkin, however, was neither wordy nor silent, but 
his looks and actions were more eloquent than his phrases. 
Ethel fluttered and trembled, and at last tried to detach 
herself. 

“Don’t, please, don’t,” she whispered, “you hold me 
too tight; you hurt me.” 

On this he released her, and she sprang away, as if to 
escape. 

“ Ethel,” he pleaded, “ don’t leave me yet, sweet.” 

She turned and looked at him, like a shy, wild creature, 
tremblingly, uncertain whether to go or to stay. 

“ I think I must get dinner — I mean lunch — ready. Is 
your toothache gone?” (He was now by her side again.) 
“ I forgot all about it. ' You will stay to lunch— won’t 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


59 


you? Father won’t be home. No, sir, you mustn’t.” 
He was going about to encircle her again; but she put her 
hands on his shoulders, administered a timid little kiss, 
and escaped. 

When she was gone he walked restlessly up and down 
the room, pulling his moustache, rumpling his hair, and 
performing other uncouth actions indicative of the excite- 
ment in which he was. He wished to follow her. What 
excuse could he give? He looked down: — his fishing boots. 
He strode into the kitchen. 

“ Will you let me take these big boots off?” 

Of course she assented, with a smile and a blush, gave 
him a pair of slippers, and went on peeling potatoes. 
When the slippers were on he came and stood by her, 
leaning his hands on the table. He watched the potato 
turning round and round in her fingers, and the peel coil- 
ing off and dropping into the water. She grew more and 
more red and disturbed as he looked. 

“ Please,” said she at length, putting her hands and the 
potato behind her, “ please don’t watch me.” 

“ It’s ashame,” he said, hotly, standing erect, “ of your 
father to make you do such things. He doesn’t seem to 
care if you do the work and have the hands of a kitchen- 
maid.” 

“ Oh, he doesn’t make me do this. I do it of my own 
self, but only sometimes, like to-day, when Miriam is busy 
with something else. I wouldn’t mind doing it so much, 
but cold water does make the hands so rough.” 

She brought her hands forward to look at them; Jack 
seized one, damp though it was, and pressed a warm kiss 
on it. 

“ You silly boy,” she murmured, in a flush of pleasure, 
and went on peeling the potato. 

“ Why don’t you do them in warm water?” he asked. 

“ Because it would make them soft and watery,” she 
laughed. 

“ Ethel,” said he, leaning more towards her, “ I wish 
you would let me take you out of this. 1 would not let 
you soil those pretty hands for me.” 

“ I shouldn’t mind that.” 

“ Soiling them for me, you mean?” She nodded. 
Again he seized the damp hand and kissed it. “ But,” 
said he, “ there will be no necessity. I wouldn’t let you 


A KEVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


60 

drudge for me, however poor I might he. You’ve had 
enough of drudgery to last a life-time. You shall sit in a 
pleasant room — ” 

With a piano?” 

“ Of course. And you will play, or read, or work, or 
sew little things, or dress and drive out, or walk out, just 
as you please.” 

“ And the servants will call me ‘ mum,’ and serve me 
on hended knees, won’t they?” she said, giving him a 
bright, trustful side-look. She chirruped a merry little 
laugh. “I’m afraid the sudden change to all that would 
be as bad for me as warm water would be for the potatoes. 
Don’t look at me as if you were surprised 1 should say any- 
thing clever.” 

“ Do you know what I intend we shall do? We shall 
go to Scarborough — do you know Scarborough? Scar- 
borough is beautiful at this time of year, though very few 
people know that. We shall rest there awhile and enjoy 
ourselves; the place my father has bought is close by.” 

“ Shall we go and see him?” 

He looked down at tlie potatoes while he answered, “ Of 
course we shall — sometimes.” He must have a natural 
genius for prevarication and long practice in it who would 
make the insincere coin of speech ring like sterling truth. 
Jack had little of the gift, or, as yet, of the practice of 
lying. Ethel looked at him, and the shadow of a doubt 
passed across her happy prospect, a formless doubt, but 
still a doubt. She peeled her potatoes, and held her tongue 
for some moments. Jack had time to consider how to cor- 
rect the bad impression he saw his words had made. “ My 
father,” said he, “ is getting old and fractious, and dread- 
fully religious. He has got in tow lately with a rum set 
of men and women that call themselves ‘ Plymouth ’ or 
‘ Portsmouth Brethren ’ or something — queer frumps, that 
are always jawing and praying or argifying. There are 
always some of them about the house, and over Sunday 
there is usually a whole colony, and they preach, and sing, 
and pray, and eat, and wander all about the place and into 
the grounds, talking about the Lord and the Other One,^ 
and all that sort of thing. It’s no fun to be among them,' 
I can tell you. One of their preachers asked me to take a 
walk with him one fine Sunday evening. He didn’t say 
anything for along time; at last he said, wilh the voice 


A HEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


61 


of a man at a funeral, “ What an awful thing if one of 
us should go to bed and wake in the Wrong Place. ^ 

“ What a dreadful thing to say!"^ exclaimed Ethel. 

“ 1 knew what he meant and whom he meant, con- 
tinued Jack. “But I said, ‘Under the bed, do you 
mean? I should think the really awful thing would be the 
extraordinary condition in which one must have gone to 
bed.' Of course he thought me profane and incorrigible; 
but he didn't want to walk with me again." 

This digression was of more service to Jack than he an- 
ticipated. It not only served to withdraw Ethel's atten- 
tion from the curious path of doubt into which it had been 
drawn by his answer to her question, but it also made her 
consider Jack apart from herself more seriously and clearly 
than perhaps she had hitherto done. Poor boy! Even 
he, with all his masculine prospect of wealth and ambition, 
was harassed and unhappy at home! She was often 
tempted by one little thing and another to mutiny against 
her dear, clever, impecunious daddy; — what must Jack, 
with his spirit, feel toward his stern, gloomy, uncompro- 
mising father, who would so bind and hedge him in? If 
she were Jack, without anything to do she cared for, with- 
out anyone she cared to talk to, would she not be much 
more rebellious than Jack had been reported to be? There 
was a sad, but delightful coincidence worth noting in 
Jack's life and in hers. 

“ Your mother died, too, did she not," she said, “ when 
you were very young?" 

Jack looked at her a moment to ascertain the sequence 
of thought. “Yes," said he, “she did. If she had 
lived," he continued, in the consciousness that Ethel was 
thinking so, “I might have been a better boy than I have 
been." 

“Yes, Jack," said she. 

“ But there is a dearer connection than a mother's that 
can do more for a man when he is grown up." 

“ Do you think so. Jack?" she murmured, glancing at 
him with a flash of the true womanly sentiment of devotion. 

Jack was happy in the consciousness that he had hit 
upon the right key in which to press his suit upon a girl 
who was neither very selfish, nor very idle, nor very vain. 
Tier real worth, however, shone in upon him (like the 
warm sunbeam which fell between them through the little 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


62 

kitchen- window, and shimmered on the brown potato- water) 
and made him ashamed, for the time, of the unlawful, 
selfish desire which he was nursing for her. She seemed 
so little now the kind of girl who by glance and speech and 
bearing tempts a man to be base towards her, to fiercely 
love her for a month or two, and then to leave her, so 
much, rather, of the woman to be made the cherished friend 
and companion of life. 

He turned, and looked through the window. Miriam 
opened the door, letting in a blast of steam and the odour 
of soap-suds, and asked her mistress to assist her to wring 
a counterpane, which, already half-wrung, hung coiled like 
a serpent about her arm. Jack begged she would let him 
do it; he had a strong wrist, he said. 

“ But vvoiiH the wet floor and the steam out there bring 
back your toothache?” she asked. 

“I am sure they won't, said he. “You have quite 
cured my toothache." 

So she let him go, thinking how very kind and amiable 
he was. She busied herself preparing the meal which out 
of compliment to Jack she politely called lunch, but which 
she was compelled to think of as dinner. Jack was to eat 
of it, and she went about its cooking with an enthusiasm 
which not even ministering to such an appreciative eater as 
her father had ever before roused in her. 

Jack did not return for some minutes. He helped 
Miriam to wring the long twist of counterpane, which was 
a rather tedious business; for the girl was convulsed with 
inward merriment, that now and then exploded in sneezes 
of laughter to see a gentleman assisting in her occupation. 
He was amused with Miriam, and, when the wringing was 
done, he took a handle of the great basket of clothes and 
helped her to carry it into the yard and to hang the large 
and heavy things on the line This Ethel observed with 
approval; and when he returned and insisted on taking her 
place in stirring some savoury preparation that her face 
might not be scorched by the fire, and on pouring the water 
from the potatoes when they were cooked she thought he 
was delightful. He prevailed on her to have dinner in the 
kitchen, to save the trouble of carrying things into the par- 
lour. They sat down and enjoyed their joint cooking with 
talk, and laughter, and loving glances. Their mutual un- 
derstanding seemed perfect. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


G3 


Indeed, Ethel was unspeakably happy. The little food 
she was conscious of eatiug had the divine taste of ambro- 
sia, the water she drank was nectar; for Jack sat by her, 
confessedly her own, and hallowed with delight and hope 
every sensation and every thought. Now that the border- 
land of doubt and hesitation was passed, she felt, like all 
true-hearted women, that no gift she could make her lover 
could be too costly, no confidence she could show him could 
be too unreserved. She revealed to him now, too, an un- 
suspected serious vein, which reminded him of her sister 
Kate. 

He had given her his hand across the corner of the table, 
where they still sat after lunch was finished; she had taken 
it, and kissed it, and fondled it with a half abashed look, 
which made her action all the more beautiful and chasten- 
ing to J'ack. Then, still holding it, she gazed at him with 
so wistful an expression that he asked her: 

“ What is the matter? What are you thinking about, 
Ethel?’^ 

“ 1 was only thinking. Jack, how good you and I should 
be when we are so happy. 

“ Good? ArenT you always good?’^ 

“ No. l^m afraid 1 have been very thoughtless and dis- 
contented with poor daddy, and with many other things. ” 

“ And quite right, too.'’^ 

She looked at him, and shook her head in deprecation. 

“ You must not think me very good, because I’m not,” 
said she. “ And you, Jack,” she continued, again caress- 
ing his hand, “ must not be such an idle boy as you have 
been. Why aren’t you something. Jack? — a merchant or 
a manufacturer, like your father, or a barrister, or Mem- 
ber of Parliament — ” 

“ Or,” interrupted Jack, with a laugh, “ a clergyman 
like your father, or a player on the flute or fiddle, or given 
to any other light and agreeable occupation.” 

“ Don’t be frivolous. Jack,” said she— either not per- 
ceiving or ignoring Jack’s light sarcasm on her father’s 
profession— “ when I want you to be serious. You are 
very clever; at least,” she added, with a mischievous 
glance, “ you used to be, and you might be anything you 
like. Don’t you think it’s wrong to waste your cleverness; 
at any rate, to do nothing with it?” 

“ Perhaps,” said he, in a changed tone at being thus 


64 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


suddenly confronted with a carking view of himself, which 
he had hitherto seen only in the secret of his own heart. 
“ I wanted to go into the army, but my father won’t see 
it.” 

“ A soldier? I don’t think 1 should like you to be a 
soldier. Jack. You would always be going away from me, 
and then there might be a war, like what they say is going 
to happen now. Then where should I be? Oh, Jack, 
Jack, you mustn’t be a soldier!” 

“ Well, I can’t,” said he, caressing her, and returning 
with a laugh to his lighter mood, “ 1 can’t, so long as my 
father refuses the brass. But don’t bother about me; I’ll 
settle down into something by and bye. Now don’t look 
serious; 1 don’t like to see you serious; it’s not your style.” 

He was emphasizing this admonition in a very natural 
and becoming way upon her person, when he and she both 
observed the little window darkened somewhat, by a head 
and shoulders~the head and shoulders of Mr. Merrydew. 
They had just time to draw apart and to think, the one, 
“ Now I’ve committed myself before him,” and the other, 
“ My father! What have 1 been doing?” when Merrydew 
opened the door and walked in. 

“So, ho, Jack, you’re not gone a-fishing then. Just 
finished lunch, I suppose. I can eat something, my dear; 
I’ve had nothing since breakfast, except a biscuit at the 
Gw 3 ^dyr. You can’t have eaten much, you two. And 
here's a clean plate. Have you both been eating off the 
same dish?” 

“ Father!” 


CHAPTER X. 

IN WHICH FRIENDS FALL OUT. 

Some hour or so after Merrydew came upon the lovers 
in the kitchen, George Cardigan came striding down the 
lane with old Parry. The suspicion regarding Jack which 
had risen upon him in the morning had soon vanished un- 
der the wholesome influence of his favorite sport, and he 
was now turning over in his simple mind how he would 
chaff and tease his friend, when he reached the inn, about 
his having left the river to nnrse a mere toothache, and to 
miss the splendid fun of catching the big fish which Parry 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


65 


would produce. lie was thinking of this as he approached 
the parsonage, and hoping Jack would be content to make 
himself cosy at the inn that evening, when, glancing aside 
as he passed, he saw a fishing-rod leaning against the wall 
of the house, just by the door. He stopped and looked at 
Parry. 

“ DidiiH you say Mr. Parkin went back to The Turk^s 
Head?’^ 

“ He did say, sir, that he was going home, because he 
had a damn bad toothache. 

“ That’s his fishing-rod.” 

Further comment was stopped by the appearance of the 
parson on the doorstep. • 

“ Well, here you are again. Caught anything? Ah, 
yes, 1 see you have. A fourteen-pounder, eh? Come in, 
come in.” 

George entered, and soon learned that Jack had been 
there ever since he had left the river, and that he had been 
alone with the parson’s daughter until a very little while 
ago. Once thus on the alert, George perceived soon that 
there was a kind of magnetic understanding between Jack 
and Ethel; without looking, each seemed to see what the 
other was doing; and without appearing to listen, each 
heard what the other said. He was awkwardly silent 
throughout tea, eating without remark his slice of the sal- 
mon he had surrendered to be grilled at Merrydew’s sug- 
gestion, saying “ yes ” or “ no ” when addressed, and ob- 
serving with narrow eye his friend and the parson’s daugh- 
ter. He was at length awakened to a sense of how rude 
and preoccupied he must seem by a laughing question from 
the parso'n. 

“ Are you suffering from toothache, too, Mr. Cardigan,” 
he asked, with a look at Jack, “ that you look so glum?” 

“No, no, I’m all right, thanks;” and he made some 
effort to ease himself of his preoccupation and constraint. 
But he could not help thinking of all that had passed since 
they had come there, and observing all that was passing 
now, and the more he thought and observed the more he 
got involved, like an honest, simple soul as he was, in his 
thoughts and observations. 

There is no person more ruthlessly and obstinately sus- 
picious, when once suspicion is by some means aroused , 
than a man of average stupidity and of great frankness 

3 


G6 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


and loyalty. George’s suspicion of the morning had re- 
asserted itself as soon as he saw Jack’s fishing-rod resting 
against the wall of the house, and it gathered about itself 
other suspicions as sturdy and uncompromising as the nat- 
ure in which they were gendered. There was almost no 
wickedness now which he did not conceive Jack — his 
friend, the man who was engaged to marry his sister — capa- 
ble of perpetrating or having perpetrated. 

When tea had been cleared away and he saw Jack sit 
down by Ethel, with the manifest intention of making love 
to her, he could scarcely contain his indignation, and when 
Merrydew proposed a game to occupy him, he could 
scarcely be civil. 

“ No, thank you,” said he, “ 1 must go. 1— I have 
some letters to write. Aren’t you coming, Jack?” 

“ Coming?” said Jack. “ No; not yet.” 

“ Well, I’m going;” and he incontinently said his good 
nights, and went off. 

Merrydew was so occupied in considering this phenom- 
enon that he could not get an objection uttered before 
George was gone. When he was gone, he perceived that 
this turn in affairs might be made to work to his advan- 
tage. Parkin, he saw, was displeased with his comrade. 
Suppose he quarrelled with him, so that George took him- 
self off? Jack, being left alone, would probably devote all 
his time to Ethel, and the desire of the parson’s heart 
would be speedily accomplished. He set himself at once 
to fan Jack’s spark of resentment into a considerable fire. 
He innocently asked him whether he had not better return 
to the inn. Why? Had he not left home under George’s 
care, so to say? And was it not possible that George would 
report (he said he was going to write letters) that Jack 
was hanging about the parson’s too much — and such a par- 
son! And might not George raise trouble in another quar- 
ter? Merrydew believed George had told him something 
about his sister. And so forth. 

Ethel gave an unexpected puff to the fire beginning to 
burn up in her lover by saying, “ 1 think, at least, it was 
very rude of him to go off like that. But I suppose he 
didn’t mean it. He is rather stupid, don’t you think?” 

“ Yes,” added her father, “ I’ve always thought it odd 
he should be your friend. Jack.” 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 67 

The end of it was that Jack returned to the inn rather 
earlier than usual, in a fine heat of resentment. 

George sat in the parlour of the inn, sat in a frowsy, semi- 
castorless easy-chair (which permitted him to enjoy a rock- 
ing motion from side to side, short and stirring) with his 
long legs stretched towards the fire, seriously regarding a 
knot of hooks which he fingered. Jack, when he entered, 
was warm with walking, as well as with resentment. 
George, he could see from his hanging lip and half-averted 
glance, was offended ; and that increased his heat. What 
business had George to be offended? The night was close, 
a large fire was burning; so that — what with this, that, 
and the other — the mouldy air of the parlour was almost 
unbearable. Jack tramped across the room and threw up 
the window that opened upon the back-yard, growling the 
while: 

“ What the deuce do you want to make the room like 
this for?^' 

“ What’s the matter with it?” asked George, rather 
sulkily. 

“ Making up a fire to draw out of these dirty old chairs 
and curtains all the bad breaths of the confounded fools 
that have ever sat here.” 

“ Mrs. Evans had made the fire up before I came in,” 
said George, simply. “ She expected us to dinner, I sup- 
pose. You should blow her up, not me.” 

“ Oh, blow Mrs. Evans, and — ” 

“ And me too, I suppose.” 

“Yes, and you too, if you like,” said Jack, throwing 
him an angry glance, thrusting his hands into his pockets, 
and striding without purpose about the room. (Perhaps 
the majestic strides his big fishing-boots compelled him to 
take made him feel more in the situation of an injured 
hero.) 

George looked at him with a little understanding but 
more surprise, put his hooks in his pocket-book, and his 
pocket-book in his pocket. 

“ If you want a row,” said he, “ you’d better say what 
it’s to be about; 1 can see you’ve got your hump up.” 

“I want no row at all,” said he, keeping his eyes off 

George. “ But I must say you have behaved d d 

badly.” 


08 


A REVEREISTD GEKTLEAfAN-. 


“You were not at all rude and caddish to my friends to- 
night, I suppose?’^ 

“Your friends?’' exclaimed George, trying to fix him 
with a look of doubt and inquiry. “ ’Pon my word, I had 
no idea the parson was your friend. You’ve told me no 
end of tales about him, and called him pretty considerable 
names — ” 

“ What has that got to do with it?” 

“ Of course, it depends.” 

“You insulted both him and bis daughter ” — striding 
up and down, but declining to enforce his accusation with 
his eyes. 

“ Both him and bis daughter?” interrupted George. 
“ What did I say to her? What did 1 do?” 

“ I never thought you could be such a simple, clumsy 
fool.” 

“ By Jove!” exclaimed George, surveying him as he re- 
sumed his majestic tramp, and then casting round his eyes 
and extending his hands as if in appeal to the general sense 
of truth and justice in the world. He rocked himself two 
or three times, while he beat his fist in his palm, before he 
deliberately rose and said: “Let’s put it straight. You 
don’t care a rap whether I was rude to the parson or no, 
and it’s no use pretending you do. You’re mad after the 
girl — yes, that’s what it is— and you think I don’t like it. 
That’s why you’re in such a rampaging paddy.” 

“ You don’t like it!” Jack stopped in the middle oE the 
floor. “Come, 1 like that,” laughed he — “like it very 
much. What have you got to do with it?” 

George frowned. His eye grew fierier, and his mouth 
heavier, as he pressed close to the table, and slowly thrust 
his fists into his pockets. “ I have got to do with it, and 
I want to know what you’re going to do.” 

“ What I’m going to do? Because you’re sweet upon 
her yourself, 1 suppose.” 

A great blush surged up upon George’s face, and almost 
blinded him. He took his right hand from his pocket and 
put it back again before he replied. 

“ I can’t afford to be sweet upon any girl yet: and you 
know that.” 

Jack threw his head up and laughed— an unwholesome, 
derisive laugh— derisive hot only of the simple words, but 
also of the simply loyal sentiment moving them, that a 


A UEVERIJND ^EKTLEMAl^. 


69 


man should not let himself love a ^irl unless he was pre- 
pared to set up house with her — which made George’s 
mouth harder, and brought a steely flash into his gray eye. 

“ I want to know,” he insisted, “ what you mean to do? 
You’re engaged to my sister — ” 

“ I know that,” broke in Jack; “ but I’m not married 
yet. And,” said he, with a sudden halt, facing towards 
George, “ you needn’t go talking about as if I were.” 

“No,” said George; “it’s nothing to be very proud 
of.” Jack glared at this unexpected retort. “ But,” con- 
tinued George, laying his open hand on the table, “ are 
you going to stick to that engagement, or are you going to 
make another?” 

Jack began to feel that there was more resolution and 
clearness about George’s mind than he had fancied, and 
the sense of that chafed him. He turned aside to kick a 
dusty old hassock that obtruded itself past the leg of the 
table; the kick only put it in his way, and with a short ex- 
pletive he kicked it again. 

George stood with his hands behind him, waiting for an 
answer. 

“ You’ve gone on with the girl pretty quick,” said he, 
“ since you came. To-day you were with her all day — 
bad with toothache.” 

“ And if 1 were, what is that to you?” said Jack, throw- 
ing himself into a chair. “ You surely don’t imagine your- 
self, my dear fellow, to be the champion of female virtue 
in general, as well as guardian of your sister’s interests in 
particular?” 

“My sister’s interests!” exclaimed George, growing 
more hotly exasperated. “ I wish she could see that she 
had best have nothing to do with a fellow like what you 
show yourself to be.” 

“ I wish she could,” retorted Jack, with a laugh, cross- 
ing his legs. 

For a minute— one tense minute, during which each 
could almost hear the heart-beats of the other— George 
stood with his hands clenched, ready to rush upon his 
friend. Jack saw this, though he appeared to be occupied 
with the wide top of his boot; a discreet instinct advised 
him not to raise his eyes. George put his hands in his 
pockets and walked out. 


70 


A REVEREKD GENTLEMAN. 


chapt^:r XL 

IN WHICH FRIENDS GO THEIR WAYS. 

Next morning about nine o’clock, Parkin was suddenly 
aroused out of an inclination to slumber on indefinitely, 
by the recollection of what had passed the evening before. 
He must meet George at breakfast. It was hard to believe 
that anything had happened to change the footing on 
which he and George had stood to each other. What in 
the world should he and a simple, docile, good-natured 
fellow like George quarrel for? He was no doubt at that 
moment standing in his usual harmless, good-tempered 
way at the parlour window, whistling softly, with his hands 
in his pockets. He must not then keep him waiting 
longer; he would go down and salute him as if nothing 
had happened; they would eat and talk together, and 
things would be as they were. 

With this cheerful prospect, with a long yawn and a 
shiver, he found himself standing on the floor. After a 
self-delusive attempt at a sponge-bath, he washed and 
dressed and went down, his footsteps, it must be confessed, 
strangely lingering about the bottom stairs and the parlour- 
door. 

There was no one in the room! The table was laid for 
only one! He felt first disappointed, then surprised, and 
then somewhat anxious. He rallied himself, however, and 
held both hope and judgment in suspense till he had rung 
the bell, and questioned the person who should answer it. 
Mrs. Evans herself came to his summons. 

“ Breakfast will be in one minute, sir,” said she, begin- 
ning to re-arrange the crockery on the table. “Mr. 
Cyardigan had his near two hours ago. Breakfast he 
called it, though it were only a drink of milk and a bit of 
bread:: for he said he must away over the mountain.” 

“ Over the mountain?” 

“ ’Deed, sir, that’s just what he said. And,” continued 
she, looking into the cup which she was about to rub with 
her apron, “ says 1 to myself, ‘ That will be through the 
half dozen or so words you and Mr. Parkin had together 
last night.’ ” Jack’s cheeks put on a livelier hue, for he 
remembered that in the''“ half dozen words or so ” were 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


71 


one or two opprobrious of Mrs. Evans. “ Not/’ said she, 
turning directly to him with an emphatic inclination of 
the head, and laying a brown, choppy forefinger on his 
sleeve — “ not that 1 am a person to listen about and eve- 
drop, as the saying is, like the first woman in the gyarden 
—for the evedropper hears little good, and it’s true — but 
it just happened that that window there was open. Dear- 
a-dear! that two nice young gentlemen should go saying 
things to one another like old Jones Parry and his wife!” 

“ Did he say where he was going? ‘ Over the mountain ’ 
means anywhere between this and England.” 

“ ’Deed, to be sure and it does. Mr. Cyardigan did not 
say, and 1 did not ask; for, thinks I, it’s only for the day, 
till the huff blow off of him.” 

“ Huff! If 1 don’t feel huffed why should he?” 

“ You think, then, sir, there’s nothing in his going 
away? — that he’ll be back all right?” 

“ 1 don’t know. But, of course, all he has had goes 
down in my bill.” 

“ Oh, the poor young man! I was not thinking of that 
anything at all, but only that going off in that way, with 
a wild heart, like as it were, over the mountain, he may 
fall into mischief — there’s a many bad quarry-holes as ye 
go over Mowddvvy way.” 

“ No fear of that. His heart’s all right,” laughed Jack. 
“ I expect you’ll see him turn up to dinner to-night. So 
let’s have breakfast, Mrs. Evans. ” 

“ Well, 1 hope it may be as you say, Mr. Parkin, sir,” 
said the landlady, adjusting her apron, and drawing to- 
ward the door. “ But, poor young man, it would be 
dreadful if anything happened to him from here — and a 
clergyman’s son, too. Will you have eggs or salmon for 
breakfast, sir?” 

Jack named his choice, and she withdrew. 

He would not yet let himself believe there was actually 
a breach between him and George. George, he assured 
himself, would turn up to dinner, cured of his dignified 
sulkiness by hunger and the loneliness of the mountain. 

When he had eaten his breakfast, he sauntered out into 
the village, with a cigar in his cheek, and his hands in his 
pockets — at a loose end with himself in George’s absence; 
for only an enthusiastic angler can go fishing all alone. 


72 A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 

Had it not been that he felt really shy of seeing the Merry- 
dews after the “ goings-on of yesterday (which to-day 
somehow appeared in the relief and impersonality proper 
to history), especially disinclined at present to meet Ethel, 
he would have gone on to the parsonage. As it \yas, he 
scanned more leisurely and attentively than he had hitherto 
done the village maidens whom he encountered in big 
valanced calico bonnets; but the maidens were very shy, 
which was the more provoking because there was no obvious 
and iiKJoncealable good point about any one of them — such 
as the turn of an instep or ankle, or the curve of a bust — 
to tempt a closer or more particular observation. He was 
about to turn impatiently back to The Turk^s Head when 
he caught the glance of a sparkling eye leveled at him over 
the little red curtain of the post-ofiice window. Over the 
eye was a well-marked black eyebrow, and above that a 
mass of frizzy black hair. Jack at once found the win- 
dow of the post-office interesting. He took note, with a 
smile, of something his casual observation had missed. 
The main concern of the post-office being the distribution 
of tallow candles, sweets, tobacco, stale tarts, and bright- 
colored handkerchiefs, the strictly official part of its busi- 
ness was pushed into a very small corner; a very little 
window to the left of the large one was labeled “ Post 
Office in insignificant letters; three of its four little panes 
of glass were put out and replaced by wooden ones, in one 
of which was a slit marked “ Letters,^^ while the two others 
were hinged (the hinges looked unused) and marked, sev- 
erally, “ Knock for Inquiries, and “ For Letters to be 
called for.^^ While he noted these droll points, the bright 
eye was still levelled at him over the blind. He went to 
the door, lifted the latch (while a shrill little bell rang out 
an alarm), and entered. When he saw the owner of the 
sparkling eye he was ready to turn at once and flee. She 
had a heavy, gorrilla-like jaw and muzzle, and a mascu- 
line, thick-set figure. However, having entered, he bought 
some stamps, and inquired if there were any letters for 
him. While the young woman turned to look, his eye 
was attracted to a letter lying at the end of the counter 
near him, evidently addressed for the post. The style of 
the superscription seemed familiar to him. He inclined 
his head a little toward' it, and recognized the round, 
steady, school-boyish hand: “Miss Cardigan, Sherborne 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


73 


Vicarage, Yorkshire.^' The young woman said tJiere was 
no letter for him; he said, “ Thank you,’" and walked out. 

Almost unconsciously he walked back to the inn. So 
George had written to his sister! He now almost under- 
stood the implacable resolution with which George must 
have left him the evening before, and was in a measure 
astonished at it. His remonstrance had accomplished too 
much. He had, he assured himself, in reality only desired 
to rid himself of George’s troublesome interference with 
his comfort, and — and his pleasure; why could not a quiet, 
stupid friend and — and, yes — dependent agree to that, 
as, surely, was to be expected of him? Why should he in 
his ill-temper and obstinacy set himself to produce results 
that were not reckoned upon — and disagreeable results, 
too? Yet, after all, why should he have stirred George up 
at all? If ho had said nothing George probably would 
have said nothing — would not have seriously interfered 
with him. By going another way to work than he had 
taken, he could even conceive he might have made him 
into an approver, if not an ally. Aiid who set him on to 
do as he did? he asked himself; for of himself he could not 
have been so hasty and impolitic. Who but the man whose 
interest it would be (if it was anyone’s) to cause a rupture 
between him and George’s people? Ah, now did the mat- 
ter look clearer to him! Had he only been as a puppet 
pushed forward, and worked u]:) and down by some deft 
management? The thought was bitter to him, and made 
him throw away his unfinished cigar. Was Merrydew, 
then, really scheming to make himself his father-in-law? 

Just at this point he reached the inn, and found Mrs. 
Evans at the door, trying to read a note which had evi- 
dently been brought her by a young man standing by. 
When Jack appeared she appealed to him. 

“ Here is something Mr. Cyardigaii has sent about his 
things; the young man says he has to take them.” 

“ By all means, then,” said Jack, ‘‘ let him have them.” 
Then he looked at the note: “ Mrs. Evans, please give the 
young man that hands you this my portmanteau, which is 
packed in my bedroom, and my fishing-boots, and my fish- 
ing tackle. 'They are all ready in my room.” 

He handed the note back to Mrs. Evans, saying: “ That 
seems all right. The man had better take them, and 
passed into the irm. 


71 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


When once in the parlour, he flung his hat into a corner, 
and strode up and down, vigorously condemning everybody 
under his breath. George had taken himself off into space; 
well, let him go and work the train of consequences which 
he had set agoing by that letter to his sister! And Merry- 
dew, the scheming, impecunious parson, would no doubt 
rejoice at the satisfactory results of his hints and jibes! 
Was it not most intolerable that a young man who desired 
only to go his own way, and asked nothing of others but to 
be let alone that he might go it, should be thwarted, and 
worried, and made use of? Well, well; he would let them 
see he would go his own way yet. 

Having thus let himself boil up, he pulled himself, so 
to say, off the fire, and gradually simmered down. He 
took a turn or two up and down the room, and lit himself 
a second cigar. It occurred to him that it would be a 
shrewd stroke to write a letter to his father, anticipating 
George^s statement, which would be sure to be conveyed 
to him by Mrs. Cardigan. The conception of this added 
considerably to his growing sense of superiority to the situ- 
ation. It was not pleasant to see on so young a face the 
mocking, sinister expression with which he sat down to 
write the letter. 

He thanked his “ dear father for the blank cheque 
sent him a day or two before; he had not yet made any 
use of it. He reminded him of what he had already writ- 
ten of his finding Mr. Merrydew at Glyndfrdwy; he was 
not sure, he said, whether he had made much mention of 
Mr. Merrydew ’s daughter, who kept such house for him 
as his stipend could maintain. That daughter was very 
good-looking — indeed, a very passable and very pleasant 
girl — and had fascinated George Cardigan entirely, so com- 
pletely, indeed, that the poor, simple-hearted fellow was 
outrageously jealous of any other male person speaking to 
her. “ Only to-night,^ ^ wrote the young man, and with a 
new smile he raised his pen and inscribed at the top of his 
letter the name and date of the day before, and then went 
on, “ we had a bit of a row, because 1 had been civil to 
the girl. I had, I know, been a little more attentive-like 
to her than I otherwise would have been, just to make 
George wild, but he accused me of making him miserable, 
and of wanting to break off my engagement to his sister. 
Then, 1 suppose, I got a little rusty, and said I thought it 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


75 


was rather hard if a man, because he happened to be en- 
gaged to one girl, must not be civil, or have a little joke 
with another girl. He took that in the very worst part 
(not like George usually, as you know; but he is so infatu- 
ated about this girl), and bounced off, declaring there was 
nothing he wouldn't do to save his sister from a fellow like 
me." 

He paused and looked at what he had written, with great 
satisfaction — remarking inwardly that “the governor" 
would say, “Just like that Jack;" which rellection proba- 
bly encouraged him subtly to be more than ever “ that 
Jack " whom his father petted and deplored. After a line 
or two more he concluded his letter. Then he added a 
hurried-looking postsci-ipt, dated that day: “On coming 
down to breakfast this morning, I find George is gone off, 
over the mountain, goodness knows where — perhaps with 
the girl. " 

That done, he rubbed his hands and laughed. He then 
methodically folded, sealed, and addressed the letter, and 
put it in his pocket to post. 


CHAPTER XII. 

THE parson's OTHER DAUGHTER. 

While Parkin was thus occupied with the anxious “ en- 
vironment " which had sprung up about him during the 
past twelve hours, this is how matters were at the parson- 
age: 

Merrydew had just finished an explanation with Ethel 
regarding the affairs of the day before, when he saw the 
postman coming. He went out to meet him, and took the 
letter he handed. Having glanced at the superscription, 
he hurriedly tore the envelope open. 

“ Who is it from, father?" his daughter asked. 

“ What, child?" said he, turning with an abstracted 
look. 

She repeated her question with some hesitation. 

“ Oh," said he, “ it's from Kate." 

“ From Kate!" she exclaimed, gaily. “ It's a long 
while— a fortnight, I should think— since we heard from 
her." 

“ It will be longer," said her father, “ if you don't be 
quiet "—glancing at the letter the while. “ Phool by 


76 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


Jove!” he suddenly cried. “ SheW^ He had the words 
“coining home in his mouth to utter, but he stopped 
them with the thought (looking at Ethel), “ If I tell her 
now it may put her off a speedy arrangement with Par- 
kin; she’d want to wait for her sister, and then — nothing 
might come of it all.” 

“ What, father?” said Ethel. “ Not ill?” ^ 

“No, not ill ” (reading on). “ Ah, she’s had a tiff 
with the Alderman. Eh? AVhat? Whew! Here’s a 
coil!” He moved closer to the window to continue his 
reading. This was the letter: 

“ Hornsey, Thursday morning. 

“ Dear Father, — 1 am coming home to you. 1 shall 
leave this on Saturday. You will of course be very much 
astonished; so I piust tell you I had a bit of a scene with 
Mr. Cholmley last night, which upset me a good deal, 
though 1 am myself again this morning. I am dismissed 
from the privilege of teaching the stupid girls of an Aider- 
man of the City of London because I am your daughter. 
There; I must blurt it out before explaining how it hap- 
pened. When family worship was over, and I was just 
going to sit down for a little while with a book, the Aider- 
man summoned me to an interview in the library. He 
was weighed down with such a sense of importance, and 
hummed and hawed so long — leaning back in his chair, 
and talking solemnly about the painful duty he had to 
perform — very painful; but he and Mrs. Cholmley had 
agreed it must be done, whatever it would cost them. (They 
didn’t seem to have bothered about what it might cost 
other people). He was so slow and mysterious, that I got 
quite worried, and could have cried, ‘ Well, well! What 
is it? W^hat is it?’ I did ask at last what he meant. He 
looked rather surprised. He seemed to think everybody 
must know all about it. Then ho produced the ‘ Daily 
News ’ (which I shall post with this), and showed me that 
horrid, unkind letter of the secretary..of the Anti-Church 
Society, who lives not far from here. You will see what 
the letter is; you will know what truth there is in it. As 
for me, when I had read it, I didn’t know what to say, 
and the Alderman evidently expected me to give my opin- 
ion. He said, ‘ Well, wasn’t that my father it was about? 
I said I supposed so. Then he asked, ‘ Wasn’t it an in- 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


77 


famous, blasphemous thing that any man, and especially 
a minister of the Gospel ^ (as he supposed you would say 
you were) ‘ should read such indecent stuff in any house 
of God?’ When I heard him say all that, in his big, dic- 
tatorial way, as if he knew all about everything, and could 
manage all God’s affairs as well as his own; and when I 
thought of you, poor, dear daddy, struggling along in that 
place you dislike so much, and comforting yourself, as 1 
know you do, with the books you are fond of, then some- 
thing within me that had kept me quiet and rather afraid 
before, seemed to snap and set me free. I said, ‘ 1 don’t 
know the book that is called such names, but 1 know it 
was written by a clergyman, and I know my father likes 
it, and if he read a bit of it instead of a sermon 1 have no 
doubt it would have done any one good to listen. ’ He 
said, ‘ You doubt my friend the secretary’s word, then?’ 
Then, daddy dear, I’m afraid I got very wild, and spoke 
wildly, without thinking. It was very foolish I felt the 
moment afterward, but 1 couldn’t help it. I said, * I know 
nothing about your friend, Mr. Cholmley, except what he 
says in that letter; and I think it was very mean of him to 
stand all through it in the porch, and then come home and 
write tales to the newspapers about it. If it were such 
dreadful stuff, why did he listen to it at all?’ He looked at 
me in a way that made me feel it was all over, and said we 
needn’t discuss it any more. He got out his cheque-book 
from the drawer. I could guess what that meant, and my 
heart sunk (though it was thumping like anything), and I 
wandered what I should do. He was filling in the cheque, 
when his son, Mr. Walter, came in. He is very proud of 
Walter, and Walter speaks more freely to him than any- 
body else would dare to do. Walter took in the state of 
things at a glance, I could see that; but he pretended to 
look for a book in the book-case, and waited. Then Mr. 
Cholmley handed me across the cheque, and looked at him 
as if he wondered what he stayed in the room for. He said 
to me, ‘ That, you will see, is for thirty pounds — ten 
pounds for the half-term (which, by the way, is not quite 
up), and twenty pounds in place of a term’s notice. Make 
what arrangements you can for removing by the end of the 
week.’ ‘ Very well, sir,’ I said, and the next minute I was 
angry with myself for saying ‘ sir ’ to him, and my anger 
made me say, ‘ I never thought any gentlemau could have 


78 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


behaved iu such a bigoted way. Even if my father had 
read some dreadful passage in church, that surely doesn^t 
affect me.^ ‘We needn't discuss it, Miss Merrydew.' 
Walter was all alive and eager. “ What’s the matter, fa- 
ther?’ he asked. ‘ Sending Miss Merrydew away? — all be- 
cause of that sneaking, ridiculous letter of Price’s, I sup- 
pose.’ Then his father fired up. ‘ Be so good, sir, as not 
to talk in that way. Miss Merrydew, I shall be obliged if 
you will withdraw.’ 1 was glad to get out; for, in the 
dread of seeing them and hearing them quarrel, I was all 
of a tremble. 

“ Bear daddy, don’t be distressed and anxious about me; 
for, having to go down-stairs again, about half an hour 
later, for my book, which I had left in the library, I saw 
Mr. Walter, and he says he can soon find me another situa- 
tion — but 1 shall go home to you for a little first. He is 
very kind indeed, and gentlemanly with it all. 1 assure 
you, father, he made me feel very much better and more 
cheerful by telling me he should very much like to have 
heard you read your extract from ‘ Tristram Shandy;’ 
there are some very fine things indeed in the book; and he 
only wished it were a common thing in church to read 
passages from good classic writers instead of eternal ser- 
mons about the difference betwixt Tweedledum and Twee- 
dledee. That’s what he said. 

“ But this letter is too long already. 1 shall travel by 

the train that gets to Oswestry at ; I shall have to take 

my chance of a local. Love to dear Ethel, and yourself, 
from 

“Kate.” 


CHAPTER Kill. 

sleight of hand. 

So Kate was coming home: he looked about as if doubt- 
ing whether there would be much of a home to come to. 
He was invaded by a new sense of insecurity; he felt mat- 
ters were tending to a crisis for him; yet the one thing he 
feared, like Montaigne, was fear — in himself; and that he 
was able pretty summarily to conjure down with the im- 
mediate prospect of being ten pounds better off than he 
expected. He turned round and saw his daughter Ethel, 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


79 


and somehow her patient but questioning attitude (she 
stood with her hands clasped, watching him anxiously) irri- 
tated him deeply. 

“ Yes,^' said he, with a snap towards her, “ 1 told you so: 
a pretty coil that Sunday night’s business of the porch 
would produce; and a pretty coil it’s producing; it’s begin- 
ning to unwind as far oS as London. ” 

She turned very pale, and looked terrified. He put the 
letter in his pocket and went out — urged a little, let us 
hope, by sudden compunction for the wanton stab he must 
have seen he had given his daughter. He walked out at 
the gate and along the lane, in a considerable turmoil of 
thought and feeling. Out of the turmoil he at length 
secured this desire— to see that letter in the “ Daily ^News ” 
his daughter spoke of; the paper was, perhaps, lying at 
the post-office. He then looked about him, and discov- 
ered he was walking away from the village; he turned 
about and walked briskly towards it. 

He entered the post-office some two or three minutes 
after Jack Parkin had been there, and inquired concerning 
the newspaper. While the girl looked, his eye lighted (as 
Jack’s had done) on a letter addressed to “ Miss Cardi- 
gan.” From Jack Parkin, no doubt; yet the handwriting 
was not quite such as he remembered Jack’s to be; but, of 
course, five or six years would make a great difference to a 
lad’s penmanship. He would make sure, however. 

“ Has that dark young gentleman, staying at The Turk’s 
Head,” he asked the girl, “ been in this morning? You 
know which I mean.” 

“ Oh, yes, sir,” she answered; “ he has just gone out.” 

That settled it. The letter was from Jack to Miss Car- 
digan. The parson could not but at once connect it with 
what had been said about that young lady the evening be- 
fore, and an overwhelming desire came upon him to know 
what was written in the letter. To desire with him was, 
the reader need scarcely be reminded, to try to possess. 
The girl had handed him over the newspaper; how could 
he get her to turn her back again? He suddenly evinced 
an aesthetic taste his friends would never have suspected 
him guilty of — a taste for Turkey-red handkerchiefs with 
white spots! He made the girl haul down or unpin from 
the line that ran along the back of the shop three or four 


80 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


of these articles, criticising the while, in his liveliest vein, 
the size of the spots and the pattern (covering the letter to 
Miss Cardigan with the newspaper in his hand, and lettij)g 
his fingers close over both paper and letter), and then he 
turned to the door, saying he thought he would wait till 
she had some simpler styles in, and went out. 

He walked briskly home, itching to gratify his double 
curiosity. When about clear of the village, he pocketed 
the letter, and eagerly undid the newspaper. When he 
opened it, the heading “ A Clerical Scandal, at once 
caught his eye. “To the Editor of ‘ The Daily News. 
Sir,^ a letter in leading-article type! His eye rapidly de- 
voured the half column; he smiled a thin smile when the 
secretary of the Anti-Church Society declared that it was 
only “ afterwards^' that he had discovered “ the obscene 
and ribald stuff " to have been read from “ that foul and 
scurrilous book, ‘ Tristram Shandy,' by the Rev. Laurence 
Sterne, an ecclesiastic who fitly represented in his own day 
the irreverence and ignominy which a State Church must 
always bring upon religion, just as the Rev. William 
Merrydew fitly does in our own." It is not too much to 
say that he felt a certain pride at having his name coupled 
with that of Laurence Sterne, even under these doubtful 
and anxious circumstances, and that for the rest of the day 
he half-consciously tried to play the role of Yorick. 

Then, before he got home, he hastened to read the letter 
to Miss Cardigan he had in his pocket. Of course, he 
found it was not from Jack, but from George. But yet he 
was not disappointed; for it conveyed to him one or two 
very valuable items of information. It was of interest and 
advantage to know that George had quarrelled with Jack, 
and had withdrawn to Dinas, whither he entreated that 
supplies should be sent at once to take him home; and it 
was of the g:reatest interest and advantage to read George's 
advice to his sister to have nothing more to do with Mr. 
Jack Parkin, for he was certain he was “ a bad lot." All 
the while they had been staying at Glyndfrdwy he had been 
making love to the daughter of the clergyman (his old 
schoolmaster); and George had a pretty clear notion how 
it would end; but what his notion was he did not impart 
to his sister, and Merrydew could only suspect his meaning. 
It surprised and pained him somewhat to read the oppro- 
brious terms in which the young man spoke of himself; 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 81 

for he had hitherto supposed that, on the whole, he had 
favorably impressed him. 

He put the letter back into its envelope, and returned it 
to his pocket. He would imitate the address on a fresh 
envelope, re-post it, and nobody but himself would be any 
the wiser. 

When he got to the parsonage, he went at once up to his 
room, and sat down to write an envelope in imitation of 
George Cardigan '’s. He laid down his pen, to give atten- 
tion to the doubts and apprehensions that pushed in upon 
him. Kate’s coming was very inopportune— could not 
have been more inopportune. (How was it that things 
with him always seemed to got suddenly mixed and awry 
just at the moment when fruition was expected?) This 
letter of Cardigan’s showed that the Parkin alliance might 
be worked to a successful issue pretty speedily. Kate’s 
coming was likely to spoil it all: it is always the unexpect- 
ed that comes to upset our hopes. But it was folly to 
dangle over idle regrets, and let his hope, his design," his 
absolute necessity be covered with ignominious defeat, with- 
out an effort to turn it aside. Might he not try to delay 
Kate’s coming — even if he could not postpone it sine die — 
and at the same time to accelerate an alliance between 
Jack Parkin and Ethel? He would go and see Parkin; he 
was almost sure to be at the inn; and it was getting towards 
lunch time. 

He produced a tolerable imitation of Cardigan’s hand- 
\vriting on the back of a clean envelope, sealed the letter 
up in it, and crumpled the old envelope away in his pocket 
(not forgetting first to tear off and preserve the stamped 
corner). Then he found his daughter warm and busy in 
the opposite room, told her he should not be back to din- 
ner, whispered slyly he was going to call on somebody,- 
and adventured forth to find Jack Parkin and lunch. He 
turned aside a moment to drop Cardigan’s letter into the 
box of the post-office, and then went on his way as serene- 
ly as the most immaculate parson in the country, as if no 
denunciatory letter had been written against him and 
printed by a terrible secretary of an Anti-Church Society, 
as if a thousand or two tongues were not at that moment 
talking about him, a thousand heads thinking about him, 
as if no episcopal suspension threatened him. 

He showed his clean shaven face and mildly lambent 


82 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


eye at the door of the bar of The Turk^s Head, smiled and 
nodded to Mrs. Evans, and said, “ Well, it's a very nice 
day. Mr. Parkin in?" Being answered that he was, and 
that he was just about to have lunch, he turned to inhale 
the appetising odour, and to hear the delightful sizzling that 
hovered in the gloom of the passage. “ Chops," he said 
to himself, “ and, perhaps, mushrooms," and passed on to 
the parlour with alacrity. 

Upon his entrance. Jack laid down his book, took his 
legs off the chair on which they were reposing, and sat up. 

“ My dear fellow," said Merrydew, getting himself a 
seat, “ don't disturb yourself. All alone, eh? Solus et 
mconsolahilis 9 Where's your George? ^ om fidus Achates 9 
Gone fishing all by himself?— while you've stayed at home 
with toothache?" 

Jack frowned, and pulled his moustache. 

“Depend upon it," continued the parson, turning his 
eyes at length upon the young man, “ lying about in-doors 
only encourages toothache, particularly that variety of it 
which goes by the name of a neighbouring lively and un- 
fortunate people." 

“ Hang it!" exclaimed Jack. “ I don't care for joking 
of that sort. " 

“ Eh? Oh, well, my dear fellow, every one to his lik- 
ing; you to the joke practical, and me to the joke — theo- 
retical, let me say. " 

“ You seem in capital spirits this morning," said Jack, 
in his hardest, most ironical tone, and with one of his keen- 
est looks. 

“ Oh, it's the old story; the criminal condemned sleeps 
better and eats better than the criminal suh judice. Just 
read that," said he, handing him Kate's letter. 

Jack took it with some perturbation and suspicion. 
While he was reading it, Merrydew, having folded the 
newspaper with the epistle delicti uppermost, sat w^atching 
his face, trying to get from it some hint how to conduct 
himself. “Now read that," said he, handing him the 
paper when Kate's letter had been read. 

The maid entered to lay the cloth, while Jack was break- 
ing into his most hilarious laugh over the secretary's letter. 

“By Jove!" said he, “he's spotted you!" and he ran 
his eye critically over Merrydew, as if to assure himself that 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


83 


the parson’s appearance when thus spotted was no different 
from what it had been before. 

Merrydew shrugged his shoulders. 

“ I’m just going to have lunch,” said Jack. “ You’ll 
stay?” 

“ Came on purpose,” said Merrydew, with a light, 
familiar nod. “ Not so much to help you to eat lunch, as 
to have a word or two with you.” 

“ Ah,” said Jack, and gave him a look half-critical, 
half- suspicious. 

“ 1 haven’t much time,” added Merrydew; “ 1 must go 
over to Clw 3 ^dd to telegraph to Kate.” 

“ Telegraph to Kate!” exclaimed Jack, with a blank 
look. 

“ Not to bring her here sooner than she proposes, but to 
put her off if I can. One daughter is quite enough for me 
to look after while you are about, you rascal. And I ex- 
pect I shall soon have to leave this, bag and baggage. ” 

“ You do?” said Jack, looking blanker. 

“ I am pretty sure to be inhibited, you know, after that, 
and I think we shall go back to London. You look disap- 
pointed, my boy. ” 

“ Do I?” 

“ Yes, yes; I know. But you’d much better not. Do 
as you say your father wishes you: marry the Cardigan 
girl, settle down, and beget sons and daughters. Breed 
horses, and dogs, and pigs, and become stout and rosy, as 
a Yorkshire squire should be.” 

“ I hate the country!” exclaimed the young man, put 
off his guard by the parson’s exceedingly candid manner. 

“ And I’m under no obligation to marry Miss Cardigan.” 

“ Well, perhaps so, my boy. 1 know what you’re driv- 
ing at; but no, 1 think you’d better not. You’ve made 
the poor girl in love with you, but you’d better leave her 
at that. Your father wouldn’t like your taking her in 
place of the Cardigan girl. Yes, yes; I know what you 
would say, my boy,” continued he, putting up his hand; 
“ your father would never come between you and your 
heart’s desire. But I shouldn’t like my girl to be com- 
promised at all, so let’s say no more about it.” 

Jack said nothing, but looked at his boots. After a 
wistful pause, Merrydew resumed: 

“ I’m in a hole, Jack — an ugly hole. I’ve no money, 


84 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


not a stiver; it^s all gone, and I don’t know when 1 may 
not have to ‘ fold my tent like the ATabs, and as silently 
flee away.’ If you could lend me — ” 

“ Don’t mention it,” said Jack, rising to find pen and 
ink. “ I’ve not cashed that blank cheque yet. I’ll fill it 
in for one hundred pounds, and you can have what you 
want out of that. You can cash it now, at Clwydd. By 
the way,” continued he, becoming confidential, now that 
he had conferred a favor, “ George is gone ’’—and he told 
the story of his quarrel. 


CHAPTER XIV. 

TAFFY CAME TO OUR HOUSE ...” 

Merrydew set off briskly on his walk to Clwydd, on 
very good terms with himself. The cheque for one hun- 
dred pounds lying against his heart seemed to fortify it 
against all assaults of evil; it was not his own, but he had 
a strong reversionary interest in it. Then he had a satis- 
fied sense of having fairly well managed his interview with 
Jack; he did not, indeed, know to what extent he had 
moved him, for the young man was reserved beyond his 
years, but he was at least certain that his desire was more 
obstinately fixed towards Ethel than before, and that, in 
spite of the polite injunction laid on him to the contrary, 
he would go and talk to her again within half an hour. 

Merrydew was an incorrigibly hopeful man. Nature 
had planted that faithful quality in his disposition, and 
custom had not staled its infinite variety. At sixteen, 
under religious influences, he had hoped to be a clergyman 
(in a large way of business); when a young fellow in 
Orders, with a taste for English literature, he had hoped 
to become head master of a public school (with a big 
“ P ”), and to write a history; and when the unfortunate 
proprietor of a small private school, he had hoped to suc- 
ceed as a Journalist or as a writer of plays; and now the 
Welsh parson, middle-aged and poor, as he marched along 
through the waning February sunshine, was hoping soon 
to return to the center of life — to London — to make a 
fresh start— hoping and dreaming as buoyantly as ever, to 
the discomfiture of that ancient maxim-maker (if by any 
chance he should get to ki^ow of it), who declared roundly 
that “ Youth is the season of hope.” 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


85 


Thus he beguiled the tedium of his walk, and marched 
into Clwydd with a light step and a high proprietorial air. 
The original purpose for which he had come to the little 
town he postponed until he had gone about to get his 
cheque cashed. He went first to the larger of the two 
banks. 

‘‘We cash only our own cheques/’ said the cashier. 

“To be sure/’ said Merrydew, rather blankly, “how 
stupid of me to have forgotten that!” (It was some time 
since he had had a banking account.) 

“ They may do it for you over the way,” said the 
cashier. 

So Merrydew went to the other bank, and saw the man- 
ager. He was informed that the cheque might be cashed 
at the current rate of discount, and that fifty pounds 
would be paid then and the remainder in a few days. 
Merrydew thought these terms rather hard; he suspected 
that if he were a bigger clergyman than he was, he would 
have been treated with more favor. He, therefore, felt it 
a grievance, and expostulated rather warmly; but, when 
the inexorable man in ofiice turned away with a severe 
“ It is our rule,” he accepted the terms, and angrily but- 
toned the fifty pounds into his breast-pocket. To restore 
his good temper he strolled down the main street and 
looked at the shops (and called in at The Gwydyr to have 
a little “ refreshment ”); so that before he found his way 
to the post and telegraph office the winter day was closing 
in. He wrote out his telegram to Kate, requesting her not 
to leave London till he advised her, and then, putting on 
his gloves, he turned to exchange a word with the post- 
master. The “ refreshment ” he took at The Gwydyr 
no doubt helped him to be confidential; and, perhaps, he 
was proud of having had a cheque for one hundred pounds 
in his possession, and of having at that moment fifty pounds 
in good bank notes and gold. He complained of the usuri- 
ous terms of the bank. 

“ I suppose it’s the risk,” said the postmaster, careless- 
ly; probably he was not interested in cheques then. 

“Kisk? What risk? Am 1 not known as a clergyman 
living in the neighbourhood?” 

“ Oh, yes, sir,” said the postmaster, turning away; “ and 
you’ll be much better known before the week is out.’’ 

Merrydew thought there was something of menace in his 


A llEVERENB GENTLEMAN. 


86 

look. Casting about in thought, he asked him what he 
meant. 

“ Perhaps,"" said the man, “ you"ve not seen this. He 
brought the local Welsh weekly newspaper, published that 
day for Saturday, and showed him the terrible letter that 
had appeared in the “ Daily News,"" together with an in- 
flammatory article on the same subject. 

“ No; I had not seen it,'" said Merrydew; “ thank you."" 

He went away in a whirl of anxiety, and, scarcely con- 
scious of being on the road, set out upon his five-mile walk 
home. His anxiety and apprehension were increased by a 
trifling incident which happened just as he was leaving 
Clwydd. Two men passed him, and when they had passed, 
one stopped and said to the other in Welsh, “ That is the 
rascal!"" The republication of the “ Daily News"" letter 
in Welsh troubled him very much; it would bo read for 
miles round, perhaps even over the whole Principality; it 
troubled him the more, because, so obvious a probability 
not having occurred to him, his lack of foresight in this 
made him doubt his foresight and acumen in other mat- 
ters. So all his edifice of self-satisfaction and hope was in 
ruins, for the time being. 

He was soon walking in darkness, but he could guide his 
course by the faint shimmer of the road-side ditch. The 
wind began to sigh and sound in the bare trees, and by and 
bye swooped upon him in gusts, sprinkling him with sharp 
rain. He had got considerably more than half way home, 
when a four-wheeled chaise, with one lamp, and that on 
the wrong side, assumed form, and dashed past him. There 
were three people in it, he could just discern, one of whom 
was the driver, and another a woman. He looked after it 
a minute, wondering at its reckless pace, and then resumed 
his way. 

What would he have done had he known that the woman 
was his daughter Ethel, and the third person Jack Parkin? 

The parson was scarce well on the road to Clwydd be- 
fore Jack Parkin was at the parsonage. In spite of his 
talk with Merrydew, he met Ethel with self-possession, and 
with considerable show of love and tenderness. He asked 
her if she had not expected to see him earlier; she an- 
swered, with hanging head, that she did not know. He 
went on to explain his tardiness. 

“ The fact is,"" said he, “ I"ve had a row with George', 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


87 

and he’s gone away;” and so he began his narrative (inter- 
rupted now and then with exclamations of surprise and 
regret from Ethel), and of course took care that the story 
of the quarrel told in his favor: he made poor George ap- 
pear the most presuming and dictatorial of would-be 
brothers-in-law. “And so,” he concluded, “I dare say 
he is almost home by now, to tell everybody of his sister’s 
imagined grievance.” 

“ But,” said Ethel, with some hesitation (she had com- 
punction she might, after all, be taking to herself another 
gii’Bs promised lover) — “ but you were not really engaged 
to her, were you?” 

“ Of course not,” exclaimed Jack, firmly. 

“ Your father, though, has been thinking you would 
marry her! What will he say? What will he do, when he 
knows?” 

Jack shrugged his shoulders lightly, and smiled with the 
tenderest devotion on the girl, as if, having her, he was 
utterly careless what his father might say or do. 

The result astonished even Jack, cleverly as he had 
played to bring it about. With the generous abandon of a 
woman suddenly touched by her lover’s self-sacrifice, she 
seized his hand, dropped on her knees, and hid her face in 
his lap. 

“ My dear,” she murmured, “ you are too good to me! 
You love me more than I deserve! But I will try, my 
dear — 1 will ” — looking up with flushed face and love- 
illumined eyes— “ to be worth all you will give up for me 
— if — if I can.” And again her head sank on his knees. 
“ Do you think 1 can, Jack?” she asked, timidly. 

What could Jack do but caress her, and assure and reas- 
sure her that she was, and ever would be, worth all the 
world to him? And, having still some manliness of feel- 
ing, how could he help but fling aside his scampish desires, 
again inwardly call himself a brute, and resolve he would 
not betray the dear girl’s simple trust in him? With this 
resolve he felt lighter and better, and never (either before 
or after) appeared to more advantage in Ethel’s eyes. 

So they sat engrossed with each other, thinking of little 
but the passing moment; and the fire sank low in the par- 
lour grate — the cinders falling together with a rush — and 
darkness descended to envelop them and the world. But 
as they sat, and the objects around them grew dimmer 


88 


A REYEEKKD GENTLEMAN. 


and dimmer, there gradually seized upon their attention a 
vague sound out-of-doors, which rapidly grew, and re- 
solved itself into a confused murmur, as of angry voices, 
and a shuffling and splashing of many heavy feet in miry 
ways. Then they stirred and asked each other, what could 
be the matter? The sounds came nearer; they entered at 
the parsonage gate, and filled the yard, and Jack and 
Ethel, rising by common impulse, looked through the 
window, and saw a dark, surging crowd of people, who 
evidently had caught sight of them in the fire-light behind; 
for they raised savage shouts and brandished their arms. 

“ Oh, Jack,"^ cried Ethel, clinging to him, “you hear 
them! What shall we do?’^ 

“ What do they say? What do they want?’' 

“ They are calling, in Welsh, ‘ Have out the cursed 
parson, the blasphemer!' If father should happen to 
come home now! Oh!" she cried; for a stone crashed 
through the window, and smashed something on the other 
side of the room. 

“ I'll go to the door," said Jack. “ Now, don't be 
frightened for me, dear; and while I take up their atten- 
tion, you close these shutters, and then go and close the 
others, if there are any." 

Jack went to the door, first taking in his hand the 
heavy, knotty- head walking-stick which he usually carried. 
As soon as he was observed, the men set up a shout (he 
began to distinguish women among them), and pressed 
towards him. 

“ Now, then," he shouted, with as authoritative a voice 
as he could assume, “ what do you people want?" 

All shouted and gesticulated together, but the only 
sounds he could distinguish were hohel and Merrydeio, sev- 
eral times repeated. He was the more exasperated at this, 
because he felt sure they must be saying something oppro- 
brious. Still they pressed about him, shouting and jabber- 
ing, and wildly shaking fists and sticks. He felt so 
impotent in speech, his anger began to swell beyond his 
control, as he glanced from this side to that of the fierce 
Babel; he was about to dash madly in among them with 
his stick, when a shock-headed quarryman made at him 
with a knife (he could see the gleam of the blade). He 
had parried the blow with his stick and struck the man on 


A IlEVEllEND GENTLEMAK. 


89 


the arm, when he felt his own arm caught from behind, 
and heard EtheFs voice. 

“ Come in. Jack! oh, come in! They are threatening 
you with dreadful things!"^ She had pulled him in, and 
shut the door. “ They say you were there on Sunday 
night, too, and are as bad as father!” 

Blows and kicks now resounded on the door, which 
shook it, and seemed likely to break it in. 

“ What shall we do?” implored Ethel. 

“I donT know yet; I must think. What does Idbel 
mean?” 

Ethel stared at Jack. (They were now in the kitchen.) 

“ Bobel she exclaimed, “ means people!^* 

“ Is that all?” said he. “ They donT seem to be on 
this side of the house yet. Yes; that’s what we must do. 
Wrap yourself up; we can go out this back way and past 
the crowd — they won’t notice us — and down the lane. We 
may meet your father, and turn him back.” 

“ Oh, yes!” exclaimed Ethel. 

“ Miriam,” said he, turning towards the girl, “ won’t be 
afraid to keep the house till some help comes.” 

Ethel repeated this, and the girl at once replied, Oh, 
no, mistress; not afraid at all.” 

Ethel went to wrap herself up, and Jack got his hat and 
greatcoat, and pondered what he should do when Ethel 
and he had reached the village, in the probable event of 
finding the parson there. While anxiously listening to the 
sounds from the front of the house, and fearing they might 
next moment come round to the back, he had a vague sub- 
consciousness that this unlooked-for catastrophe was some- 
how working him a very good turn; he did not perceive 
yet in what direction exactly, except that it was raising 
him to a heroic height in his sweetheart’s estimation and 
love. 

Soon they had made their way out by the back door, 
round the crowd, and were trudging as fast as they could 
down the lane, she holding fast by his arm. When they 
reached The Turk’s Head, Mrs. Evans met them, and 
thanked God, and then proceeded to add to their alarm. 

“ Such things as will be, if they lay their hands on Mr. 
Merrydew; and no polices about anywhere at all, until 
you get to Clwydd! He’s gone to Clwydd, and will be 
coming back! Somebody should go and stop him!” 


90 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


Ethel turned eyes wide with anxiety on Jack. To Jack 
there then suddenly came the clear perception of what he 
must do; he had no choice, he assured himself, but do it. 
Fate, by unforeseen and irrefragable circumstance and 
event, was impelling him; he was merely impersonal 
Fatehs persona] agent. 

“ Ethel, my dear,^^ he said, taking her aside (and Fate 
took some colour from the cheek of its agent), “ there is 
only one course open to us. The people are all evidently 
roused to a terrible pitch by that Sunday night^s business, 
however they have got to know of it. Your father can not 
live here any more. If he comes back, these savages will 
do him some frightful mischief — may even take his life. 
Can you trust me, dear? — trust me entirely?^^ 

“ Oh, Jack!’^ Her look was full of the fondest confi- 
dence and worship. 

“ Then, Ethel dear, 1 will pack up at once, and hire a 
trap to drive to Clwydd; we may pick up your father on 
the way, or find him at Clwydd. 

“ We, Jack?^" 

“ Yes; you must come with me. Didn’t you under- 
stand? There is no safety anywhere here. You saw the 
angry crowd about the green as we came in.” 

“ But if we don’t find father?” 

“ I shall leave a note, telling him where to find us; he is 
sure to come in here before going on to the parsonage. ” 

“ Very well. Jack; you know best.” 

So it came about that they drove to Clwydd, and passed 
Merrydew, and did not see him. 

They seemed to Mrs. Evans to have scarcely gone when 
Mr. Merrydew entered The Turk’s Head; he was very pale, 
and seemed very tired. 

“ Oh, dear! Mr. Merrydew, sir,” exclaimed the land- 
lady, shaking her head; “ such a condition! — such a state! 
— such a harum-scarum! You did not see them then? — 
your daughter and her young gentleman? They drove 
away just about half an hour ago.” 

“Ah! A four-wheeled thing did pass me, with three 
people in it.” 

“ That would be Parry and them.” 

“ Did they leave no — no word for me?” 

“ Mr. Parkin, sir, left this letter — if they should not 
pick you up, or meet you at Clwydd.” 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


91 


He tore open the note with trembling finger, and read: 

“ Dear Merrydew,— I have taken your daughter out 
of danger. Your house and everything in it is very likely 
in ruins by now. You can’t stay any longer in Whales, any 
more than she can. I can look after her; you had better 
look after yourself. 

“Yours, J. E. P.” 

Merrydew subsided into a chair, with the note still open. 
He felt as if he were the center of a cataclysm; all the 
waters of destruction seemed washing over him. Without 
a home and without a prospect; his daughter gone — gone 
he knew not where, nor into what condition! To do him 
justice, this was the severest calamity of all; for he loved 
her after his fashion, and wished to make her happy as 
well as he knew how, and his awkward and pressing cir- 
cumstances would permit. He would grievously miss her 
bright, cheerful presence and her filial ministrations, 
which had been so much to him during his exile among 
these barbarians, and which seemed to have been more, 
now that he was deprived of them. The thought of her 
defection at this crisis — the child whom he had nourished, 
and cherished, and planned for — raised a disagreeable lump 
in his throat. 

While he sat overwhelmed with his trouble, Mrs. Evans 
kept up a dropping fire of dolorous remarks on the gravity 
of the situation, to the consciousness of which he rose at 
last. 

“ 1 suppose,” said she, “ they’ll be expecting you to join 
them to-morrow in the morning. For, to be sure, Mr. 
Merrydew, sir, you can’t think of going back to Clwydd 
to-night; and if you will put up here, you can have a bed, 
and welcome—for I don’t think any of them have seen you 
come in.” 

He thanked her, and thought that was the best thing he 
could do. She said she would bring him some tea, for he 
must need it. Insensibly cheered by the good soul’s atten- 
tions, and comforted with food and w^armth, his elastic 
nature began to expand again, and to buoy him upon the 
waves that had seemed likely to overwhelm him. His 
prospects were not so utterly wrecked and waterlogged but 
that he might fioat along yet. He was not entirely friend- 
less, even in that sharp crisis (he felt very grateful to Mrs. 


92 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


Evans); his powers of enjoyment were not impaired, and, 
better still, he thanked God he still had some of the means 
(he helped himself a second time to the pigeon pie). Then 
he remembered — he was surprised he should have forgotten 
so long — the fifty pounds he had in his pocket He took 
out the notes and the gold, and fingered them; the magic 
of their touch at once brightened the immediate future. 
He reflected, of course, that the money belonged to Parkin; 
but the reflection did not seem to dim the brightness. 
Those who have never known adversity, or had a vision of 
want, can not guess how very solacing to a person in the 
depth of misfortune the possession of a sum of ready money 
can be. The needy, shifty man says then in his heart, not 
“ All is lost save honour,'^ but “ All is lost save cash.'’^ 

Merrydew forthwith began to arrange his future action, 
with a cheerfulness which was only obscured now and then 
by something like a threatening sound out-of-doors. He 
would go to Clwydd next morning, as early as possible, to 
avoid collision with any angry Taffies that might be about; 
he would see Jack Parkin, and insist upon his marrying 
Ethel out of hand; that done, he would journey to Lon- 
don; he would find Kate, and they would set up house- 
keeping together; and they would get on very well, for 
.Kate was a good, clever girl, and would be of more use to 
him than Ethel had been. In the meantime, when the 
night had well set in, he would pick his way up to the par- 
sonage to see what could be done with his property there; 
he hoped against hope that he would find it had suffered 
little or no damage. 

So, between nine and ten o’clock, he left The Turk’s 
Head by the back entrance, and set off toward the little 
house that was to be his home no longer. If his heart beat 
rather violently as he crossed the upper corner of the vil- 
lage green, upon which some men stood talking, and took 
a path across the fields, which saved a bold march up the 
village street, there is no need to set that down to coward- 
ice; but he did not wish to court an encounter with any 
number of his exasperated parishioners. He found all 
silent about the parsonage. He knocked at the back door, 
and, after some parley, was admitted by Miriam, who was 
keeping ward with her faithfiil Parry Jones. 

He went upstairs and packed a few necessaries in a bag, 
locked away his papers, took a hurried survey of his rooms. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


93 


and returned to Miriam. In the amplitude of his recourse, 
he made her a present of a half sovereign, and said he 
would leave the house in her care — and, by the way, if any 
letters came for him in the morning she had better bring 
them on at once to The Gwydyr at Clwydd. So he bade 
farewell to his Welsh home, and, bag in hand, carefully 
trudged back to The Turk’s Head. 


CHAPTER XV. 

THE END OF THINGS WELSH. 

Next morning Merrydew was aroused while it was yet 
dark by the assiduous Mrs. Evans, who announced that she 
had ordered Parry to drive him to Clwydd, and that break- 
fast was ready. He ate his breakfast, and prepared to go. 
He pulled his purse out, but Mrs. Evans protested she 
would not think of such a thing. He thanked her impress- 
ively, bade her adieu in a manner which fluttered her fool- 
ish vidual heart, mounted the vehicle, and was driven 
away. He went direct to The Gwydyr, where he ex- 
pected Jack and Ethel were put up. He pushed past an 
astonished maid who was cleaning out the lobby, and in- 
quired at the bar for Mr. Parkin. He was told there was 
no gentleman of that name — indeed, no gentleman at all 
— staying in the house. He was taken aback at this; but 
he elicited the information that a young lady and a gen- 
tleman from Glyndfrdyw had stopped and eaten some- 
thing there the evening before, and had then driven to the 
station, it was supposed to take the train to Oswestry. 
They were, doubtless, Parkin and Ethel. Farther than 
that strong suspicion he could not advance then; he could 
not leave Clwydd for several hours, because he must see the 
bank-manager about the balance of Jack’s cheque, and he 
must find someone to take his place in church next day, if, 
indeed, he were not relieved of that duty, as he suspected 
he might be, by a suspensory intimation from the bishop. 

He therefore went into the coffee-room, and awaited for 
Miriam, and ten o’clock. A little after nine, Miriam 
arrived with a letter. It was from the bishop, or rather 
the bishop’s secretary. Mr. Merrydew was informed, in 
guarded prelatical language, that until the truth or the 
falsehood of certain reports was established it would be well 
he should hold himself aloof from clerical duty; the Rev- 


94 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


erend Mr. Davids (the bishop’s chaplain) would relieve him 
on Sunday. 

“ That’s all right,” said Merrydew, putting the letter 
in his pocket. 

He then bethought himself that it might be well if he 
were not seen in the open street in Clwydd; he could write 
to the bank-manager from Oswestry, or from any other 
place. He consulted a time-table, and saw there was a 
train in a few minutes to Oswestry. He at once ordered a 
fly and drove to the station. There he learned that a young 
lady and gentleman had taken tickets to Oswestry the even- 
ing before — and therefore to Oswestry he went. 

And there we must leave him for the present. 

While he sat in the coffee-room of The Gwydyr, list- 
lessly turning over the newspapers of the day before yester- 
day, his daughter Kate had been set down at Clwydd Station 
by the first train from Oswestry, and had been driven past 
the door of The Gwydyr, on her way home to her dear sis- 
ter and her not much less dear father. 

Her arrival at this juncture needs a word of explanation. 

Kate had the family characteristic of a somewhat im- 
pulsive temper. She received, of course, her father’s let- 
ter on Friday morning, and the news it conveyed of what 
was passing at home made her resolve to prepare to leave 
London at once, instead of waiting till Saturday, as she had 
intimated in her letter to her father that she would do. 
She packed her boxes and drove to Paddington — and by 
that token missed her father’s telegram. Arrived at the 
station, she found she could not travel farther that day 
than Oswestry. In that inevitable arrangement she cheer- 
fully acquiesced, however, when she considered how dismal 
the drive from Clwydd in the dark would have been, and 
how pleasant it would be to appear at the Glyndfrydw par- 
sonage just in time for breakfast. 

As she was driven along the road from Clwydd, there- 
fore, she was hungry and impatient. She urged the driver 
to extraordinary speed by promise of a shilling to spend on 
Llangollen ale. 

She had alighted to open the gate, had run up the gravel 
and knocked at the door, and was about to pay the driver, 
who already had her boxes on the door-step, before she 
began to wonder at the silence, and, turning to look at the 
house, observed that the shutters of the windows were 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


95 


closed. What did it mean? — that the household had over- 
slept itelf? She knocked again a loud rat-a-tat-tat, and 
waited. A broken pane of glass then caught her eye, and 
another and another. Afraid of she knew not what, she 
stood back from the house and glanced at all the windows; 
all had broken panes, not cracked and fractured, as if by 
accident, but smashed, as if by violence. Then hurriedly 
she took in the devastation amid which she stood — the 
trodden grass, the trampled plants and shrubs, and the 
uneven gravel. In her desperate alarm she appealed to 
the driver. 

“ What has happened? Do you know? — have you 
heard?’’ 

The man had heard nothing; but, he declared, craning 
his neck, there must be somebody in the house, for smoke 
was coming from a chimney. 

Kate discovered for herself that this was true; smoke — 
thin, blue smoke, like that of a dying fire, she dismally 
thought — was issuing from the kitchen chimney. She was 
making her way round to the back (with a sob in her 
throat at the disappointment of this home-coming, and 
the bitter doubt that there was an end of this home, as of 
others, through somq new, unexpected turn in her father’s 
affairs; she knew that to him the unexpected was always 
happening) when she was met full by a tall young man 
with fresh, frank face. 

“ Hallo!” he exclaimed. “ I beg pardon,” he added, 
hurriedly. “ You must be Miss Merrydew; I know you 
by your sister. I’m George Cardigan; of course you don’t 
know me?” 

“ No, I don’t,” she said, looking up in his face, and as 
she looked, she instinctively put trust in him. “ Perhaps, 
though, you can tell me what all this means. Are you,” 
she suddenly asked, “ the gentleman who has been staying 
here with Mr. Parkin.^ — my father wrote to me the other 
day, and mentioned that.” 

“ Yes; I’ve been here with Jack Parkin,” he answered, 
rather evasively; “ we came for a fortnight’s fishing. But 
on Thursday night we had a bit of a row, and I went away 
and was waiting at Dinas till I heard from my father, when 
I happened to hear of this flare-up.” 

“ What flare-up?” 

“ You haven’t heard, then? No; how should you? You 


96 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


drove straight through the village, of course. Well, it^s a 
thundering pity; I"m awfully sorry I had anything to do 
with it. ... 

And the ingenuous young man, with sonie hesitation, 
told of the wager of the Sunday, and the reading of “ Tris- 
tram Shandy in church. 

‘‘1 know about that, said Kate, “and the letter in 
the ‘ Daily Kews/ But what has that to do with this?"' 

Then George explained what the reader already knows 
— about the indignation of the Welsh folk and its origin; 
he had been told at Dinas if the men got hold of the par- 
son they would murder him. “ So,^’ concluded he, “ 1 
came over here to see what I could do, but too late. It’s 
just my luck.’^ 

“You don’t know, then, what has become of my father 
and sister?” 

“I don’t. But I think Mr. Merrydew must have got 
wind of what was up, and gone away with your sister, 
somewhere, in time; he’s too fly — excuse me — too wide- 
awake to let them catch him.” 

Kate said nothing in reply. Her father and sister had 
gone she knew not where, without a word (though, indeed, 
she considered a word might have been sent to London, 
which she had missed by leaving so early). What should 
she do? 

“ First of all,” she said, turning to George, “ I had bet- 
ter see what the inside of the house is like. There is some 
one in — is there not?” 

“ I don’t think there is. But we can have another 
look. ” 

He led the way round to the kitchen door, on which he 
delivered a round of raps with the head of his stick. Ko 
answer came. He examined the window and found he 
could open it, and in that way she entered. 

“Oh,” she said, “you might be so good as pay the 
driver for me; that’s his fare, and I promised him a shil- 
ling for himself;” and she put the money in George’s hand. 
He looked at her a moment and then exclaimed, “You 
don’t mean you’re going to May here, and send the cab 
away?” 

“ Yes; why not?” 

“ Don’t you think you should at least go back to The 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 97 

Turk’s Head? It’s not safe for you here, and Mrs. Evans 
might tell you something. ’ ’ 

“I’m not afraid of being molested. I shall stay and look 
after the house till 1 hear from my father. I shall go and 
see Mrs. Evans by-and-bye. But I’m very hungry ” — and 
she smiled — “ I expected to find them at breakfast ” — the 
smile almost yielded to something like a sob. “ I must 
get myself some. ” She turned to look at the fire. 

“ By Jove, you’re a plucky girll” cried the simple young 
man, lost in admiration. “You must excuse my saying 
that; but you are. 1 don’t know another girl that would 
do it!” 

“ Don’t you? It’s only that I’m not afraid of the 
people.” She smiled again; and from that moment 
George Cardigan was her devoted slave. She turned to 
him: “ Will you come in and have some breakfast?” 

“ No, thanks. Shall I go and hear what Mrs. Evans 
has to say, and come back and tell you? I daresay cabby 
will give me a lift as far.” 

She accepted his offer of service, and he departed. 

She was finishing her breakfast when he returned in 
company with Miriam. The girl was overjoyed to see her 
mistress. Her story was soon told; master and Miss Ethel 
had not left the house together; and she had just returned 
from The Gwydyr at Clwydd, where she had found the 
master alone. Kate was troubled; she turned to George 
Cardigan, who stood looking out of the window with de- 
pressed and glum aspect. 

“ Could Mrs. Evans tell you anything?” He shook his 
head. “You saw her, 1 suppose?” 

“ Y^’es, Miss Merrydew, 1 saw her. But, perhaps, you’d 
better wait and see her yourself; she’s coming along here.” 

“ Why, is anything serious the matter? Oh, tell me.” 

Thus adjured, George brought out what he had heard in 
rather lumpish fashion, coloured awkwardly with what he 
suspected, as was natural to his simplicity. 

“I’m very sorry. Jack Parkin and your sister, it seems, 
drove off to Clwydd last night together, and really passed 
your father on the road, coming this way, without his 
knowing them in the dark; they left a note for Mr. Merry- 
dew at The Turk’s Head, and he drove after them this 
morning. But Miriam says she only saw him. It’s a 
thundering shame; but I was afraid it was coming to that.” 

4 


98 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN". 


“ Coming to what? What do you mean?"’ 

The changed tone of her voice made George start and 
quail somewhat. 

“ Well, perhaps 1 shouldn’t say.” 

“ If you’re not prepared to say, you shouldn’t insinuate!” 

“ Don’t say that. Don’t be angry, please. But it was 
about that Jack Parkin and I had the row on Thursday 
night. 1 thought he was hanging about your sister too 
much, considering he was engaged to my sister.” 

“ I see,” said Kate. “ Thank you very much or telling 
me so plainly.” There was a coldness in her tone and 
look which cut poor George to the heart. She turned to 
Miriam. “ Miriam, I know you must be tired, but per- 
haps you will try and go to Clwydd again at once with a 
very particular note from me to my father; you may find 
somebody driving from The Turk’s Head.” 

“ I wish you would let me carry it for you. Miss Merry- 
dew,” interposed George. 

“ If you would, Mr. Cardigan,” said Kate, a little soft- 
ened, “ you would oblige both me and Miriam.” 

So the note was written, and George set off. What the 
note contained is not of tlie smallest consequence; for, of 
course, it was not delivered. 


CHAPTER XVI. 

“the "WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID.” 

“ There be three things that are too wonderful for me, 
yea, four, which I know not — the way of an eagle in the 
air; the way of a serpent upon a rock; the way of a ship in 
the midst of the sea; and the way of a man with a maid.” 

Many things have happened, many mysteries have been 
solved since Agur the son of Jakeh uttered those words, 
yet the fourth of his incomprehensibles remains as wonder- 
ful and mysterious as when the seer of the desert spoke. 
Even “The divine Williams,” who somehow got at the 
secret of most things, did not quite grasp the secret of that 
fourth procedure. He knew a good many ways of men 
with maids, but he nowhere shows us that hidden inner 
way, which if found would be the key to all the rest. It 
goes without saying that no philosopher of to-day, whether 
ideal or positive; no novelist, whether romantic or natural- 
istic, synthetic or analytic, and no dramatist, whether melo- 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


99 


dramatic or Eobertsonian, can tell us any more about 
this Eleusinian mystery than vv^e have been told by the Arab 
Agur or the English Shakespeare. Not even George Mere- 
dith can tell ns more. 

The older a man grows, and the more he sees of the 
hearts nearest him, the more beautiful and divine must the 
love of woman appear to him — perhaps, the one divine 
thing in a world which too often seems forsaken of things 
divine altogether — and the more incomprehensible must it 
appear how any male creature made of common clay could 
ever have compassed the possession of such love. An 
ordinary selfish young man, of good intentions, and con- 
duct not quite so good, wins the first, the fresh, blushing 
love of a girl. Why? How? Nobody knows. An out- 
sider who attempts to guess, only gets impatient with his 
guesses. The young man himself, if he is honest, and if 
he is not a conceited ape, will confess he cannot quite tell 
why or how — except that he intensely longed for it, and 
finally asked for it. And the girl, if one venture to put 
the question to her, can give no better answer than the 
song gives: 

“ I love him, for he is my love.” 

Why exactly, or how precisely. Jack Parkin became the 
object of the entire maidenly love of Ethel Merrydew— of 
a love that suspected no evil, because it knew none — I do 
not profess to have been able to tell. The young man 
himself was surprised, even a little humbled, by its gen- 
erosity and humility. I think he would have been better 
satisfied with himself and his intentions if he could have 
found any reason for supposing that her devotion to him 
and her belief in him were less thorough than they seemed 
to be. At least I would not give much for the pleasure 
cf his sensations or the ease of his conscience for some time 
after his abduction of Ethel in the chaise from Glyndfrdwy. 

At Olwydd he exacted he would have some difficulty to 
keep her from waiting for her father; but so complete was 
her trust in him, that he had no sooner urged that he 
thought it would not be quite safe to remain there, either 
for I hem or for her father, then she assented. 

“ Very well. Jack; you know best. But you will leave 
a message for father — vvon^t you?^^ 

“ Oh, yes; of course. 


100 


A REYEKEKD GEKTLEMAK. 


Emboldened by her submission to him, he then ventured 
to ask whether she was not curious to know how their 
future movements were to be ordered. She came very 
close to him, took his hand, and said she was quite content 
to leave the ordering of them to him — she was perfectly 
happy to be with him, and to feel he was taking care of 
her. (They were then in The Gwydyr, waiting for some- 
thing to eat.) 

“ It^s not wrong — is it?^^ she asked. 

“ Wrong? Eo!’^ exclaimed Jack. 

“ But where do you expect father to come up with us?^^ 

He did not say that he hoped Merrydew would not come 
up with them at all; but he explained that her father would 
discover very quickly that he could not face the people of 
Glyndfrdwy again, that he would, therefore, probably stay 
that night at The Turk’s Head to arrange something 
about his household belongings, and that he would come 
on in the morning to Clwydd, whence he would be sure to 
find his way. “We,” said he, “ cannot travel farther 
than Oswestry to-night.” 

“ Must we stay all night at Oswestry, then? In the sta- 
tion?’^ 

“In the station? No; at an hotel. We shall make 
ourselves comfortable; have breakfast early and then go 
on. What’s the matter?” 

She looked very disturbed. 

“ Oh,” she exclaimed, “ J must go home! 1 can’t go 
into a strange house! I have no — I have no luggage!” 

lie laughed, and soothed her. 

“ You forget,” said he, “ there is probably no home to 
go to— unless— unless you can be at home with me.” She 
hid her face on his shoulder. “As to luggage, we can 
soon make that right. Just you write down ^n a sheet of 
paper what you want, and we can send down at once to 
the draper’s.” 

“ But — but I have no money.” 

“ Never mind; I have some.” 

“Jack,” said she, giving him a look full of trustful 
love, “ you are good to me.” 

She went to the writing-ta'ble, and wrote out her list, and 
put it in an envelope; and in a few minutes the parcel was 
in her hands. 

Jack was anxious until the engine puffed with them out 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN* 


101 


of Chvjdd Station, for he was not sure but that Merrydew 
might suddenly sliow his face in the coffee-room of The 
Gwydyr; even after they were bumping on the road to 
Oswestry (a Welsh train always bumps, as if to remind you, 
argximento iniinito, you are iii a land of mountains) he sat 
silent and preoccupied; he was debating a nice point of 
conscience with himself, as he glanced at the unconscious 
Ethel going to sleep in the corner. He thought of her 
charming innocence, and her childlike trust, and he formed 
a very virtuous resolution. That done, he leaned towards 
her and began to talk. He returned to a former question: 
“ Was she not curious as to their destination after 
Os west ry?’' 

“ Well,^’ said she, demurely, “ I suppose you are going 
to take me to your own — home — are you? — or, to Scarbor- 
ough? That's it.^’ 

“ Yes; to Scarborough. You're a little witch; how did 
you guess that?" 

“ Oh, 1 guessed that, because you said the other day you 
would take me to Scarborough, when — when you took me. " 

Arrived at Oswestry, they drove to an hotel which Jack 
knew. He ordered something for supper, and left Ethel in 
the coffee-room while he went to the bar and engaged two 
rooms — for “ Mr. and Miss Parkin." 

Next morning they were up betimes to continue their 
journey. They carried sandwiches with them, because 
there would be no convenient opportunity for a meal until 
they reached their destination late in the day. 

Ethel had travelled very little in her time. The only 
long railway journey she had ever made was that from 
London, two years ago, to Wales; so now, delighted to be 
alone in Jack's company, and feeling content about her 
father, she abandoned herself to the pleasure of the rapid, 
even motion of a well-ordered express train. It was some- 
thing altogether novel to her to observe the character of 
the country change as they whirled onward, and to have 
pointed out to her as actual places— towns large and small, 
and throbbing with life — what she had hitherto known 
merely as clots with names on the map. And Jack was 
very tender and attentive to her; he entered into her sim- 
ple delight, and pointed out to her places of interest on 
either hand. When they passed through a country grimed 
with coal and cinders, cumbered with ugly buildings and 


102 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


tall chimneys, and obscured by smoke, she looked sad and 
wistful; when they rushed past fields and hedge-rows, and 
tall trees, and over streams of clear water, she uncon- 
sciously brightened, even though the fields were sodden and 
the trees and hedges bare; and broke into little cries of 
pleasure at the sight of a cosy farm-house, a pretty church, 
or even of a frightened young horse or flock of sheep scam- 
pering away from the roaring train. Up into the tunnel 
through the bleak hills, and down with a rush into York- 
shire. It was a new surprise to see mills and tall chim- 
neys, and the black heads of coal-pits trying to make them- 
selves look at home in picturesque dales and nooks. On 
they dashed through a country of ineffaceable variety and 
charm, in spite of the encroachments of manufacturing 
enterprise; now for a minute or two in the midst of human 
poverty, and ugliness, and squalor, and now out again into 
the bracing open, till they were swallowed up by the 
smoke, and murk, and noise of Leeds, the capital of York- 
shire business. 

It was wearing late in the afternoon. Jack had for some 
time been silent and restless. At Leeds he got out and 
hurried to the refreshment-room--and again at York, when 
they were within but an hour of Scarborough. It soon ap- 
peared what he had nerved himself for. 

“ Ethel darling, he began, sitting very close to her, 
“ I want to say something to you. We canH get married 
at once, you know — because Ve must be at least fifteen 
days resident in a place before we can get even a special 
licence"^ (so he declared), “and even with that we must 
manage it very quietly, because I don’t want the governor 
to know it just yet.’’ 

“ So I suppose. Jack,” said she, with composure; “but 
we are not in a hurry; we can wait— can’t w^e, dear?” 
That was not quite what he wanted; he tried again. 

“Oh, yes,” said he; “we can wait, no doubt. But 
you don’t quite understand, Ethel, my dear. People know 
me in the public parts of Scarborough; we can’t go to a 
hotel for that reason; the governor might get to hear of it; 
we shall take lodgings away over on the cliff; but, Ethel 
dear, to two i)eople like us no one would let rooms, unless, 
dear, we went as— as husband and wife. Listen to me, 
darling,” he implored, for she had started from him at his 
last words. 


A EEVEKEND GENTLEMAN-. 103 

“ Oh, we must not do that. Jack! Surely there is some 
way — at least until father comes?’^ 

“ AVell, we can try,” said he, in cold offence; “ we may 
find some one willing to believe us to be Mr. and Miss 
Parkin.'^ 

“ Why not my own name?” she asked. 

“ Why? Don’t you see that would be worse still? It is 
a dead certainty no landlady would take us in then.” 

“ You’re not cross with me. Jack?” She looked at him 
wistfully. 

No, dear; I’m — I’m hurt. I thought you trusted 
me.” 

” Oh, so I do — I do, my dear!” She clung to his arm, 
and he turned to entreat her again. 

“ See, Ethel darling,” he pleaded softly in her ear, “ if 
you really trust me, what can be the difference between to- 
day or a fortnight hence? especially since it makes it so 
much easier for us to settle it now.” And then he urged 
warmer pleas, to which she listened downcast and trem- 
bling. She felt he was much agitated, and she thought 
his agitation something to pity, instead of to resent. Who 
was she, she thought humbly, that she should, with her 
scruples, cause pain and disquiet to love so strong and gen- 
erous as his? He loved her very, very much. Was not 
that clearer now than ever? 


CHAPTER XVII. 

IN PURSUIT. 

When Merrydew reached Oswestry he found he was 
hungry. He left the station to get something worth eat- 
ing, and to consider his further progress. He had already 
settled with himself that Jack and Ethel were not now in 
Oswestry; was it then of any avail that he should put in 
practice the exhaustive method of the dullest kind of de- 
tective, and inquire at one inn after another, till the right 
one was discovered, whether a dark young man and a fair 
young woman had spent the night there? He would see 
whether he could not show something of detective skill. 
He would take it for granted Jack had wished to leave 
Oswestry as quickly as possible — by the first train that 
would carry them anywhere in particular; but would it 
be the first train Up or the first train Down? Would he 


104 


A REVEREi^D GENTLEMAN. 


travel towards London or to the North? Then tliere came 
to Merrydew the recollection of what Ethel had told him 
concerning the mention of Scarborough, and to Scarbor- 
ough he was satisfied they had gone. Still he would try to 
make assurance doubly sure. 

When he returned to the station, he went to the booking- 
office, and looked down the great table of names of stations 
to which “ bookings were “ open.^^ 

“ Let me see,^’ he said to himself, “ ‘ stations on other 
lilies.^ Yes; Scarborough, of course, is on another line. 

‘ S ‘ Sc here we are — so that^s all right. 

The ticket-office was not open; but, since he was in the 
amateur-detective vein, he turned to get what he could out 
of tlie porters. He found the man that labelled luggage. 

“ Ah, now,’^ he said, “ I want to get through to Scar- 
borough; 1 suppose you havenT got a label for that sta- 
tion?’^ 

“ Yes, sir; as many as you’ll want, I daresay. Train 
ill half an hour.” 

“ Yes, I know. You don’t have to stick on Scarbor- 
ough labels often — do you?” 

“ Stuck on two this morning, sir. A young gentleman, 
first class, and a young lady.” 

When the ticket-window was open, Merrydew, without 
preliminary, asked for a ticket to Scarborough. 

“We don’t book to Scarborough, sir,” said the clerk. 

“Not book to Scarborough! Why, it’s on your booking- 
table; and you’ve booked there to-day alreaviy!” 

“ Yes, sir; but not by this train. You can’t travel 
further than York to-day.” 

“ Then, I suppose, I had better go to York.” 

It was late when Merrydew reached York. He marched 
straight into the Station Hotel, and ordered a comfortable 
meal. When he sat over it in the gorgeously appointed 
dining-room, with spick-and-span waiters hanging obse- 
quious on word or nod, he determined he would not go on 
to Scarborough till Monday morning. Whatever harm had 
been done would not be increased by waiting a day longer; 
and the somewhat disagreeable duty of calling his old pupil 
to account for running away with his daughter might well 
be postponed over Sunday (Merrydew had a certain profes- 
sional sense of decorum suitable to that day); so to-mar- 


A EEVEREND GENTLEMAN". 


105 


row he would mildly disport in the solemn ecclesiastical 
atmosphere of the old cathedral city. He would go to the 
Minster, and listen to the music; after lunch he would en- 
joy a stroll round; he remembered having heard or read 
that there were interesting Roman remains; the walls, he 
believed, were wonderfully ancient, and solid, and worn; 
and then, after that, he would take his ease at his inn, 
and submit himself to the genial influence of agood dinner. 

This programme he carried out next day very faithfully. 
He was perhaps now and then invaded by a twinge of mis- 
giving that he should not be thus luxuriously idling; but 
the twinge passed and was forgotten. 

He made up for his Sunday’s rest by taking a reasonably 
early train for Scarborough on Monday morning, in spite 
of the bitter cold which had suddenly come to nip the early 
promise of spring. As he turned down the main street of 
the seaside town, everythijig had a singular air of hiberna- 
tion. There was not a soul to be seen, except here and 
there a shivering apprentice taking down the shutters of 
some shop, and blowing his fingers. He had not arranged 
his order of proceeding, but he thought he would first visit 
the largest hotel — the Grand, overlooking the sea — where 
he would quarter himself in any case. Not finding the 
fugitives there, when he had engaged a room for himself, 
he was at a loss what next to do. VV^hile he stood wonder- 
ing, a mild west breeze sprung up, and the sun came out. 

Merrydew descended to. the glistening wet sands. The 
sunshine warmed him through and through, and he wan- 
dered on, in the briskest enjoyment of the air and the 
scene, quite oblivious of his errand. He approved of the 
fishermen and maidens, and he approved of the Spa. 

There are warm, fresh days of spring when, it is said, 
you can hear the trees and grass grow; this was a day when 
you could hear and see rocks split, and see great slices of 
turf and soil burst from the clitf-side and plunge with 
a heavy sumph into the gulf below. All the stretch of 
clilfs, as far as he could see, looked chipped and pieared 
on their rocky face, and torn, and ragged, in their over- 
hanging turf, while at their base lay tons of newly-split 
rock and sodden soil; it looked, Merrydew thought to 
himself, as a huge rampart might look after a furious 
bombardment. He observed, too, that here was the literal 
fulfilment of Bottom’s resonant lines: 


106 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


“ And raging rocks 
With shivering shocks 
Shall break the locks 

Of prison gates.” 

For hitherto itiigitessed grottoes and caves had been re- 
vealed. 

Merrydew recited these sounding words aloud, and was 
somewhat startled to hear a subdued laugh from somewhere 
at hand. He looked rouiid a jutting piece of rock, and 
saw, sitting comfortably in the mouth of one of these re- 
vealed caves, two persons — dark Parkin and his daughter 
Ethel! They also saw and recognised him. He went to 
them at once. 

“ Ah,"^ said he. “ Well, there you are. I found you, 
you see.^* 

“ HavenT you been a long while?” exclaimed his daugh- 
ter, embracing him and blushing deeply, as he looked at 
her rather askance. 

Jack said nothing, but recognised him with a nod. 
Merrydew turned about lightly, pointing to the cliffs. 

“ I was just,” said he, “ looking at all that disintegra- 
tion. That’s how the cliff goes, you know. When 1 was 
here last the cliff-top in front of those houses up there — ” 

“ It’s up there we are staying,” said Ethel. Jack beat 
his leg with his cane. 

“Oh, indeed,” said Merrydew. “Well, that cliff-top, 
three years or so ago, was not so far back by some yards. 
You know how all this happens — don’t you?” 

Receiving no sufficient affirmation that they knew, he 
delivered a little scientific lecture: How the rains of 
autumn and early winter soak the oil, and filter through 
into cracks of the rock; how frost comes and expands the 
water and makes it burst its bonds; and how, after that, 
comes thaw, more rain, filling up the widened cracks and 
fissures, and frost returns — and so on — till the final explo- 
sion rends rock and soil. 

This lecture in loco did not go off well. Ethel perceived 
Jack’s silence and constraint, and was aft’ected by them. 
They lingered a little, looking anywhere but at each other, 
and trying hard to enjoy the promise of the scene around 
them. The sea romped and frolicked on the mussel-beds, 
and made sudden insidious rushes at the busy fisher-girls; 
the cliff, besides its cracking rock and slipping earth had 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN’. 


107 


water in abundance with which it made music — tiny, tink- 
ling rills and dashing cascades. All was bright, warm, and 
musical, and tempted to the thought of spring. But, as 
they turned with one consent their steps back lo the town, 
they observed that the blue of the northern sky was being 
obfuscated, and the wind met them as chill as ever. By- 
and-bye, as the darkness spread over the heavens, a flake or 
two of snow fluttered into their faces. They took the 
warning, puBed their wraps closer about them and harried 
back, in silence, save for an occasional exclamation from 
Merrydew. The whole sky was soon overcast, and the air 
turbid with falling snow. The wind increased, and the 
snow drove in finer flakes, thicker and fa-ster. By this 
time all three were safely sheltered in the lodgings on the 
cliff: they were not yet prepared to enter upon explana- 
tions; they uttered a commonplace remark or two, and 
affected to be absorbed in the rapidly-growing storm with- 
out. 

At twelve o'clock it had been like spring, and a bird 
had piped in a coppice; by two o'clock it was winter again, 
and the whole country-side was several inches deep in snow. 
Before dark, all the winds were ranging the deserted 
streets, and a north-easter was raging on the sea. The 
tide was up, the frothy surf was hissing in the shingle, 
and, where the three stood under the cliffs in the morning, 
sea and rock were mingled in a wild battle for the mastery 
of a poor fishing-smack that had got driven between them. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

MUTUAL UNDERSTANDINGS. 

There is no sufficient reason for supposing that Nature 
on that Monday was more interested in the impending 
Merrydew troubles than in the troubles that might be 
threalening many other persons quite as deserving of sym- 
pathy; yet, for all that, the Merrydews ever after thought 
of that day in connection with certain woes, and felt that 
its remarkable changes were somehow out of concern for 
them. 

It is almost unnecessary to say that Jack Parkin had not 
dreamt Merrydew would find his way to Scarborough. It 
was perhaps natural, under the circumstances, that he 
should at once suspect Ethel of having somehow communi- 


108 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


calcd with her father without her lover^s knowledge; and, 
suspecting this, it was not to be wondered at that when he 
followed her out of the sitting-room he was curt and pee- 
vish, especially since he could not say anything about his 
suspicion, after having given reason for supposing he had 
himself left Merrydew know their destination. 

“ Aren’t you glad. Jack,” said Ethel, putting her arms 
about his neck, “ that father has come?” 

‘‘ Yes, I suppose I am,” said he, coldly returning her 
embrace: he felt it would be ungenerous not to respond at 
all. “ But I think we were very well before he came.” 

“ Yes, Jack, we were,” said she, detaching herself from 
him; a shadow of misgiving came upon her, as she remem- 
bered how kind and bright Jack had been that very morn- 
ing before her father appeared. What was the reason of 
the change? 

Jack felt himself in an awkward temper — a temper he 
did not himself approve of, so he put restraint upon him- 
self, and said no more; and in another minute they were 
again in the sitting-room. 

Over lunch the increasing ferocity of the storm out-of- 
doors afforded them subject for spasmodic talk (they could 
see from their seat at table the whitening fury of the sea). 
Merrydew alone seemed quite self-possessed; he prattled 
about the kindness of Mrs. Evans, the almost intact condi- 
tion in which he had found the parsonage, and the episco- 
pal letter which Miriam had brought him at Clwydd. 
Jack’s embarrassment was increased by what he considered 
Merrydew’s diplomatic reserve regarding the situation; had 
he known how little diplomacy and how much timidity had 
to do with this reserve he might have precipitated the in- 
evitable explanation. After lunch the explanation came 
sideways. 

Ethel had withdrawn while the table was being cleared. 
Jack had risen, and stood looking out of the window at the 
gathering whiteness. When Merrydew and he were by 
themselves there was a pause, and then he turned. 

‘‘ By the way,” said he, “ I suppose you got that cheque 
cashed?” 

Merrydew palpably changed color and described his at- 
tempts to get the money without unnecessary detail. Jack 
perceived this, and became more himself. 

“I was going,” said Merrydew, “ to write for the rest 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


109 


to-day; 1 intended to write yesterday. I have made some- 
thing of a hole in the sum they paid over to me; I had 
settled with myself to borrow that. Was that not right?'^ 

“ Oh, perfectly/" said Jack. “ Is that as much as you 
want?’" 

Merrydew would have liked all the hundred, but ho said, 
“ Ah, yes, 1 think that will do; oh, yes, I think it will."" 

“ Then you’ll hand over to me the fifty when it comes. 
I expect I shall have some extra expenses."" 

“ Yes, of course,"" said Merrydew. There was a pause. 
Then — “ lt"s a delicate question to ask a man, and an old 
friend — what are you going to do about Ethel? I know, 
my boy, you haven"t had time to marry her yet; but Fm 
her father, you see, and naturally, of course — naturally Fm 
concerned about her, and — and her future. You"re living 
here— connubially, I suppose?"" 

“ Yes,"" said Jack, blushing in spite of himself. “ We 
can get a special licence, I suppose, at once, from York?"" 

“ Is that how you are going to do it? You can’t very 
well, certainly, do it earlier — than at once,"" said the par- 
son with a smile. 

“ It"s a very hurried way of getting tied for life,’" said 
Jack with a frown. 

“ Well — yes; it is. But she"s a good girl, and she’ll 
keep you straight."" 

“ But the fact is,"" said the young man — “ there’s no 
use hiding it — I am rather afraid what the guv’nor may 
say. There would be no harm in waiting a little to square 
him — no longer than a fortnight, say, in any case; and 
that will only be as long as a licence used to take. Won’t 
it?” 

‘‘I suppose so,"" said Merrydew; “yes, 1 suppose so. 
But you’ll be good to her. Jack; be good to her. ” And 
the parson rose, patted him benignantly on the shoulder, 
and walked to the window. “ Do you think,” he asked, 
turning again, “ that I can have a bed here?” 

Jack did not reply for a moment; he sat moodily, medi- 
tating. He was caught — fairly caught. The man was 
taking it as settled; and he could not refuse to marry the 
girl— the girl who had given herself to him. Ha! it would 
be well if he had no reason— no better reason than he had 
now — for suspecting that she had caught him, tool Here 


110 


A REVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


now was her father coolly proposing to come and live with 
him, live on him, probably. 

“I don^t kuow,^’ he said, somewhat churlishly: “you 
can ask. 

Merrydew was a little piqued. 

“ Oh,'’ said he, “it’s of no consequence; I’ve engaged 
a bed at the Grand for to-night at least. I only thought 
it would be more sociable, and perhaps a trifle cheaper. I 
mustn’t run into expense, you know. 1 shall stay in 
Scarborough only till your little affair is over, then I’m 
off to London.” 

“ Oh, I dare say you can have a room here,” said Jack, 
a trifle mollified. “ Indeed, I’m pretty sure you can at 
this season. ” 

So the bell was rung, and the landlady was summoned. 
A room was engaged for Mr. Merrydew, and a messenger 
was dispatched through the storm to bring his bag from 
the Grand Hotel. 

When the gas was lit, and the three sat before the fire, 
listening to the dismal whoop and howl of the storm, with 
a cosy sense of being sheltered from it, and an occasional 
shiver at the thought of what it must be to be wrestling 
with it on that terrible, ravening sea. Jack threw off his 
moodiness and made himself agreeable, but, singularly 
enough, none of them ventured to speak of the future. 

After dinner, Merrydew sat down to write letters; a let- 
ter to Kate (addressed to her as still in London); a letter 
to the Olwydd banker, requesting the remittance of fifty 
pounds; a careful little letter to Mrs. Evans, begging her 
to be so kind as inquire out an honest auctioneer (if such a 
person were by any chance to be found) who would take 
over the contents of the Glyndfrdwy parsonage at a valua- 
tion, with the exception of certain articles which he named 
and requested Mrs. Evans to see packed and set aside to be 
forwarded to him hereafter; a neat communication to the 
bishop, resigning his living, and returning the licence which 
two years ago his lordship had granted him to officiate in 
the diocese. 

Jack Parkin the while had sat down with Ethel to pass 
the time at cribbage. But ho soon tired of this gentle tete- 
a-tete game, threw down his cards, stretched his legs, rose, 
and said he thought he would go out and see the effects of 
the storm; he believed he had heard a distress-gun fired at 


A keverekd gentleman. 


Ill 


sea. Ethel insisted he should wrap himself up, and helped 
him to do it. When he was gone, she sat and gazed at the 
fire till her father should have finished his writing. 

“ There, said he, throwing down his pen at last, 
“ that’s done. If Jack now had waited a few minutes he 
might have posted these for me. I suppose I must take 
them out myself.” He went to the window and raised a 
lath of the Venetian blind. “ Ugh! What a night it is!” 

“ Father,” said Ethel, “ won’t you sit down and talk to 
me a little?” 

“ Yes, my child, yes; certainly. What,” said he, draw- 
ing an easy-chair toward the fire, “ shall I talk about?” 

She came and knelt by him, and laid her head on his 
breast. 

“ Do you think I have done very wrong, father? Tell 
me,” she whispered. 

“ Wrong in coming away alone with Jack, do you mean, 
dear?” he asked, stroking her hair. 

“Yes,” said she. 

“ Well,” answered he, with a sub-conscious tone of supe- 
riority to convention, “ a conventional father would think 
it not at all the correct thing, but — ” 

“ What else could I do, father dear? 1 hadn’t a minute 
to think, with those dreadful people all round the house; 
and I made sure we should meet you, and then, when we 
did not meet you, I felt certain you would soon come up 
with us.” 

“ Humph! If I had not been very clever 1 might not 
have come up with you at all.” 

“ Why, father? Did you not get the messages, the 
directions Jack left for you at Mrs. Evans’s, and at 
Clwydd, and at Oswestry?” 

“ Eh? Ah, yes; I got, 1 think, all the messages he left, 
and — oh, yes — I had directions enough. At any rate, I 
have come up with you at last, and here I am. Well, Pop- 
pot,” said he, caressing her head, “ and has Master Jack 
been kind to you, hey?” 

“Yes, father, he has been very, very kind. And— and 
he couldn’t marry me at once — could he, father? And we 
had to come and live — like this, here; Jack was afraid they 
wouldn’t take us in at all if we didn’t.” 

“ Yes; I dare say he was. And so you agreed — hey?— 


1V2 


A ilEVERilND GEKTLEMAI?. 


because — Yes, yes; 1 understand, iny dear; don’t hide 
your little head. ” 

“ And I thought, too, father, that, since Jack has been 
spending so much money, I might save him the expense of 
— of more rooms. Don’t laugh, father!” she exclaimed, 
again hiding her face. 

But Merrydew’s laugh was irrepressible; it would have 
way. 

“ You must forgive me, my dear,” he said; “ I can’t 
help it. You are a sweet, simple little girl, and. Jack’s a 
very lucky fellow. In a fortnight, then, you will be his 
wife, and 1 hope he will continue to be good to you.” 

“ You have not said anything to Jack, father — have 
you?” 

“ Said anything, my dear? Why?” 

“ Because he seems rather different since you came.” 

“ Oh, my dear, that’s just because he’d rather be alone 
with you than have an old fellow like me poking about.” 

“ You think that’s all? ’ 

“ Of course, my dear — of course.” 

There was a pause between them. Then Ethel resumed, 
raising her face to her father’s — ” I’m glad you’re not 
cross with me; I was afraid you might be, perhaps, a lit- 
tle.” There was another pause; then — “ What do you 
think Kate will say?” 

“ Kate!” exclaimed he, with an uneasy sense that he 
too often faikd to take into account the opinion of his other 
daughter, since she lived so far away. “ Oh, she need know 
nothing about it; we’ll write to her when you’re married; 
that will be sufficient.” 

“ I should have liked her to be present that day.” 

“ Oh, it’s impossible, my dear, impossible; we can’t 
think of it.” 

So the matter dropped, and presently Jack came in. 
His eyes were bright and his face rosy with battling with 
the storm. He was in cheerful spirits. (“ He has been 
having something to drink,” thought Merrydew). He 
narrated his adventures, and described the appearance of 
the beach, drenched with spiay and covered with hying 
masses of foam. He remimled Merrydew of his first" ap- 
pearance at the Glyndfrdwy parsonage, and of the punch 
which then had been made and drunk. 


A REYtRENt) gentleman. Il3 

“Let US make some now/’ said he, ringing the bell, 
and j) reducing a bottle of whisky from the sideboard. 


CHAPTER .XIX. 

WAITING. 

The next fortnight was looked forward to by two at 
least of the inmates of that lodging-house on the South 
Clitf as time that might as well be omitted from the calen- 
dar; all the interest they had in it was that it should pass, 
and bring the day and the event which should make the 
one legally a wife, and relieve the other from the anxiety 
which, in spite of everything, invaded him at times, and 
let him go free to seek his belated fortune in London. 

Jack Parkin’s behavior worried Merrydew a good deal. 
He was moody — at one time in exuberant spirits, and at 
another morose and scarcely civil — as the parson concisely 
stated it to himself, he did not know how or where to have 
him. He thought it was his presence— the presence of an 
uninteresting third person — that irritated the young man, 
and he therefore took to absenting himself for the greater 
part of the day, taking long rambles on the beach or into 
the country, consorting with the fishermen and the am- 
phibious creatures who tend pleasure-cobles in the summer 
(occasionally even venturing a little way out in a boat), 
and flattering himself he was thus laying up a stock of fine 
health for London use, and storing his mind with curious 
information. From these expeditions he seldom returned 
before seven o’clock, in time for dinner. Yet, for all that, 
and although he had usually something of tolerable inter- 
est to say concerning his day’s adventures, the evenings 
were seldom very pleasant: the time passed with friction. 

The fact is the young people wearied and disappointed 
each other without quite knowing it. Their days, of 
course, were very uneventful; but that fact alone would 
not account for their ennui; for two nowly-married people 
(they were as good as married) finding their daily satisfac- 
tion in intimate discourse with each other during the first 
weeks of their joint existence — at least so innumerable 
couples have tried to make themselves believe. Discourse, 
however, between Jack and Ethel was not so intimate as it 
might have been. For a girl of sense it is not sufficient, 
even in these early days, to be told she is sweet, she is dear, 


114 


A llEVt:REKt) GEKTLEMAN. 


she has dove’s eyes, and hair of fiiie-spuii gold, she is alto- 
gether lovely — the perfection of woman-kind— however 
warm and sincere, varied and poetical the language em- 
ployed may be, and however eloquent the accompanying 
action. She iieeds more than that. She wishes to share 
in her husband's hopes and anxieties regarding life gener- 
ally; she longs, above all, to help him, if she can, to shape 
the future. 

Ethel tried, while they sat or walked together, to draw 
Jack on into talk of what they would do when they had left 
Scarborough, but he did not know — he could not tell yet. 
One day, for instance, after breakfast, they loitered along 
the shining sands, she clinging to his arm. They had ob- 
served their landlady’s cooking was not of the best. 

“Wait,” said Ethel, pressing his arm, “ till we are in a 
house of our own, and you shall see what nice little break- 
fasts you shall have.” 

“ I have no doubt,” said he, “ you would be a clever 
little housekeeper.” 

Probably he himself was scarcely conscious of the condi- 
tional form of his compliment; at any rate, Ethel did not 
notice it. She went on. 

“Oh, I shall be more than that. Perhaps you don’t 
know that I rather pride myself on my cooking.” 

“Ah! Your father taught you that, I suppose.” 

“Yes,” said she, oblivious of the sarcasm; “he has 
taught me, or got me to learn, a great many little things.” 

“But,” said he, somewhat impatiently, “I shouldn’t 
want you to go cooking for me.” 

He did not seem to admire her simple domesticity; per- 
haps a foolish comparison crossed his mind of this girl with 
some fine young ladies he had known, who were only fitted 
to be the heads of prodigal households, and, in his way- 
ward folly and impatience, the comparison may not have 
been to the advantage of the girl by his side. 

“Still, Jack dear,” she replied, sweetly enough, “I 
think 1 must look after all the cooking and do some of the 
delicate little bits myself — especially at first, deai : 1 sup- 
pose we shall have to be very careful for seme time — 
sha’n’t we? But I’ve been used to that, you know. If 
your father should be very angry when he — he gets to 
know. Jack, what would you do?” 


A REVERENT) GENTLEMAN. 


115 


“I don^t know. I haven’t Ihoiiglit about it — my 
dear.” 

The final vocative was evidently a concession to the 
glance of disappointment she gave for his want of re* 
sponsiveness. She maintained her sweet hopefulness of 
temper. 

“ We shall not stay long here, of coarse,” she continued. 
“ AVhere do you think we shall go to live, .Jack.^ To Lon- 
don?” 

“ Yes,” said he, “ London would be rather fun.” 

“We shall take a little house — eh? There are some 
pretty houses near where we used to live, in Hampstead.” 

“ Hampstead,” said he, with a thin smile, “ is a long 
way out of town.” 

“ Perhaps it is,” said she, “ and, of course, you would 
want to go to business or something every day. Tell me. 
Jack, what are you going to do, if we go to London?” 

“ Going to do?” 

“ I mean what are you going to be? — what profession 
are you going to work at?” 

“Oil,” said he, with a laugh, “ 1 have not settled that 
yet Time enough for that. At present my profession is 
carpere diem — which means, 1 suppose you know, to enjoy 
the present You used to learn Latin — didn’t you?” 

“ Of course I did,” said she; “ you know that” 

They had by this time seated themselves on a sheltered 
rock, and they then wandered into reminiscences of school- 
days. 

Thus, oftener than once or twice, from whatever side 
she approached him and tried to become intimate with his 
inner self, she was rebuffed with impatience, or with good- 
temper. She found it very difficult sometimes to sustain 
her sweet cheerfulness — how difficult only those gentle 
creatures can guess who have themselves endured similar 
disappointment with patient, loving heart — but she was 
resolved that Jack should not see, should not think she 
was 1 1 all troubled with misgiving or doubt. Her woman’s 
wit and her love had taught her that Jack’s manner (al- 
though at times arrayed in a prodigality of protestation) 
was too much bound with constraint and reserve; yet she 
ever excused him by thinking, “ Perhaps he is very anx- 
ious about what his father may say, and about other things 
he cannot, or ^oes not like to, tell me,” and she hoped 


116 


A EEVEIIEND GENTLEMAN. 


that the eventful day, which seemed to lag so, when she 
would become. Jack’s lawful wife and would have to be 
presented to his father (as she conceived), would restore 
him to that self she had seen during the few days they had 
spent together in W ales. 

As for Jack himself, it must be confessed his situation 
was very annoying and perplexing. He had been forced 
by circumstances to carry a girl off from her home (that 
was his view of it), and her father, who was responsible 
for those circumstances, had unexpectedly turned up, and 
was taking it for granted he would marry the girl forth- 
with. That was a distinct grievance: why should he 
marry the girl? Yet, if he should refuse, would ho not 
deserve such villainous hard names as he did not like to 
think of being applied to himself? "Why, then, should he 
not marry her and have done with it? Was he not fond of 
her? Well, yes; he was; but (now that possession had 
taken off the edge of passion) he did not think she was 
quite the girl he could continue to admire and care for; 
certainly she was not the kind of girl he had expected to 
marry. And — most annoying and perplexing thought of 
all— whether he married or did not marry her, he was sure 
he would much offend his father. If he married her, then 
he would have broken faith with the girl whom he had 
before promised he would marry, and, besides probably 
disagreeable pecuniary results, he would pass a very bad 
quarter of an hour with the old gentleman when he went 
to tell him. If he did not marry her, if he — left her, for 
instance — it would be no better for him, in all probability. 
Even if Merrydew remained silent (which was not likely), 
his upright old father would be almost certain to learn the 
truth through the outspoken George, and to make it hotter 
for him than on the other alternative. A very awkward 
dilemma, indeed, we must confess, for a young man who 
only wanted to order his life for himself and not be both- 
ered. The only hope he saw of escaping either turn was 
to wait until such time at least as he would be expected to 
return from Wales, then to pay his father a visit, hear 
what George had written home, remember what he had 
himself written concerning George, and act accordingly. 
But by the end of the week this hope was cut off in unex- 
pected fashion. 

On f’riday morning there was a letter on the breakfast- 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


117 


table for the Eeveretid William Merrydew, stamped with the 
Clwydd post-mark. When the reverend gentleman opened 
it, he exclaimed, “ Bless my soul!’" but he did not fora 
little enlighten his companions as to the cause of his aston- 
ishment. He read and glanced at them, and read again. 

“It’s from Kate,” he said at length;. “ she’s at home.” 

“ Kate at home!” cried Ethel. “ In Glyndfrdwy?” 

“ I may as well read the letter to you,” said he, with a 
glance comprehending both Ethel and Jack. Kate related 
how she had left London earlier than she had intimated to 
her father that she would leave. 

“ Then you knew,” said Ethel, “ that she was coming 
home?” 

“ Er — yes; she wrote to me something about it; but 1 
telegraphed to her not to come; of course she missed my 
telegram.” 

lie resumed the letter. She described her arrival at 
home, and her meeting with George Cardigan. 

“ Cardigan there!” exclaimed Jack. 

She said Mrs. Evans had brought her his letter to read. 
Then she went on: 

“ l^ut what have you gone to Scarborough for, of all 
places? Are Ethel and Jack Parkin with you? Is that 
why? Mr. Cardigan (who is staying at The Turk’s Head, 
and is very obliging in doing things for me) says that’s very 
likely why. He says his own home and J. P.’s are not very 
far off. I shall see to the carrying out of the orders you 
sent to Mrs. E., though, of course, I must not offend her, 
dear old soul. She has been very kind to me. Please 
write to me, and tell mo about things. I am very anx- 
ious, especially about Ethel.” 

“ She must come here soon, then — mustn’t she, father?” 
cried Ethel, elated. 

Merrydew and Parkin emphasised this contingency for 
each other by interchanged glances. 

“ We must see, my dear,” said Merrydew. 

With this letter, it did not take long for Jack Parkin to 
see that the situation for him approached a crisis. Cardi- 
gan still in Wales, and acquainted with all that had hap- 
pened; his father, therefore, in all probability, knowing no 
more than had been conveyed by George’s letter and his 
own. As he thought of these things, he perceived with 
satisfaction that he might, after all, snatch a victory. He 


118 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


resolved upon a bold stroke. He would write a careful, 
filial letter to his father, putting the most chivalrous con- 
struction on what he had done, begging his pardon for such 
excusable rashness, and asking his permission to bring 
Ethel to see him. 

He was confirmed in this resolution by a chance en- 
counter with an acquaintance from near home. After 
breakfast, Ethel had entreated him to go shopping with 
her in the town. They were leaving Marshall & Snel- 
grove’s, when he ran up against Ooverley of Cleethorpe. 

“Hallo, Parkin!’^ said the Yorkshireman. “What 
are you doing here?’^ — with a curious glance at the attract- 
ive young lady who stood aloof. “ Heard you were in 
Wales. 

“ Yes,^’ said Jack; “but Eve come back. See you 
soon. 

And so they parted; and Jack, when he returned to their 
lodgings, sat down and wrote to his father. 

The kind of letter he wrote will readily be guessed. He 
kept up the fiction of his former composition, written in 
Wales. He reminded his father of what he had told him 
concerning Merrydew’s pretty daughter, whom George 
Cardigan hankered after. When George had departed, he 
(Jack) had found it was not George she had cared for, but 
himself; she had not forgotten the time when they were 
friends in her father^s school. Explanation and under- 
standing had been brought about very unexpectedly — by a 
great disaster ovei taking the parson. Merrydew had some- 
how given great offense to the villagers (Jack did not say 
how; he thought it best not to, and he knew his father sel- 
dom read newspapers); they created a riot, and came and 
stormed the parsonage. The parson was from home at 
the time, and his daughter was in the greatest danger from 
the violence of the mob. But he (the heroic Jack) rescued 
her, and took her to a place of safety, leaving word for the 
parson to follow them. They soon found, however, that 
the whole district was raised, and they had to get out of 
Wales altogether. So they had come to Scarborough, 
where he was waiting, along with the parson and his 
daughter, for his father's permission to bring Miss Ethel 
Merrydew to see him. His father would know what that 
meant. He was very sorry it would interfere with former 
arrangements. But what could he do? His having been 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


119 


seen on this hurried journey at hotels and railway stations 
alone with the giii would compromise her reputation. It 
would not be generous or geiiLiemaniy now to leave her, 
any more than it would have been that night the wild 
Welsh people attacked the parsonage? Besides, he liked 
her very much; and he believed his father would like her. 
Ho knew his father would not be very angry with hmi, 
and would write him a line at once, telling him to bring 
the young lady to Sherborne. 


CHAPTER XX. 

A PAIR OF SLIPPERS. 

The die thus cast, it was with suspense and misgiving 
that Jack Parkin awaited his father’s reply. He knew the 
old man’s obstinacy of temper when thwarted, and his old- 
fashioned, uncompromising business sense of thesaoredness 
of all covenants, however disagreeable and disastrous to 
self the fulfilment of them might be — he thought of these 
things, he recalled something he had heard (his father had 
never told him) of half the Parkin fortune having been sac- 
rificed years before to redeem a merely friendly pledge, and 
he quaked. But against this panic condition he nerved 
himself by rehearsing the instances of paternal tenelerness 
and indulgence, which in the son’s experience had not been 
few. And then had he not in his letter appealed to his 
father’s strong sense of honour? 

The reply came next day. It was very short, but to 
Jack it was satisfactory. Ethel read its curt phrase, and 
looked at it large, stiff, abruptly-turned strokes with some 
dread : 

“ Dear Jack,— You had better bring the young lady to 
dinner on Monday, one o’clock sharp. 

“Your affectionate Father.” 

There was no invitation for the young lady’s father. 
What might that mean? Merrydew said little, but he 
thought the more. 

“ He wants to see you, and to consider you, my dear,” 
lie said to Ethel, “ without having his attention distracted 
by a reprobate churchman like myself. Still, as you say, 
he need not have ignored me altogether, since we had 


120 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


something like personal relations in Jack’s school days — 
though, after all, the relations were only those of debtor 
and creditor.” 

On Monday morning Ethel was awake and stirring early. 
Jack and she were to set o2 for Sherborne immediately 
after breakfast. She knew she must impress the old man 
favourably, or it might be the worse for Jack, and perhaps 
even for herself; and the weight of this responsibility was 
heavy on her. She dressed with care, but with little hesi- 
tation, for she understood better than most young ladies 
what suited her. She regretted that the dress she had de- 
cided to wear made her look a little more plump than she 
liked to seem, but she contrived to modify that appearance 
by some lace judiciously disposed about her neck. She 
wore no jewelry (of which Jack had been lavish in his gifts), 
for she guessed that the simpler and the less expensive she 
looked, the more kindly would her prospective father-in-law 
be disposed to consider her. 

“ Hallo! dressed already?” said Jack, looking in upon 
her from his dressing-room. 

“ Yes, Jack,” said she; “ will I do?” And she submit- 
ted herself with a shy flutter to his critical inspection. 

“ Do?” said Jack, “ of course you’ll do. But what are 
you in such a fidget for, dear?” he asked, as she weiit and 
put her arms about him. * 

“ Oh, 1 want so much your father to like me.” 

“ Of course the governor will approve. He’ll think you 
the dearest girl he ever saw.” 

“ It’s kind of you to say so. Jack. 1 hope he will.” 

When breakfast was over, they left Merrydew to his own 
devices, and set off to the station to take the train for 
Sherborne. Jack was heavy-mouthed and grim, and un- 
der this depressing influence Ethel could scarcely keep her 
heart up at all. When they were seated in the railway car- 
riage Jack took out a big cigar, and prepared to smoke. 

“ It’s not a smoking-carriage,” said Ethel, anxiously. 

“ Oh, I smoke anywhere,” said Jack; ” they know" me 
all along the line.” 

This was a small matter, but it cheered the poor girl 
very much; it was a hint of the wide influence which her 
Jack so easily exerted, and which would surely smooth her 
way to the heart of the elder Parkin. She pressed closer 
to Jack and embraced his arm. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


121 


“ Tel] nie^ Jack/’ she said. “ You don’t think your fa- 
ther will be very angry with me?’’’ 

Jack looked at her with a protecting, an endearing smile. 
Her gonLleiiess, and humility, and her acute anxiety to 
please, sent a thrill of manly generosity through his rather 
selfish heart, and put him in better mood to meet his fa- 
ther. If the worst happened that could happen, he had at 
least a sweet, soft feminine creature entirely devoted to 
him, ready to wrap him in all the seductive allurements of 
her fresh young love. 

•‘Angry with you?” said he. “What for? For being 
in love with me? 1 should think not. He’s rather fond 
of me himself, and I expect that will help him to under- 
stand and like 3 ’ou.” 

“ Y^es, Jack. I hope it will.” 

The journey by train was short. As they drew up at the 
platform of the little station, Ethel nerved herself to meet 
the old man’s eye at once. But neither inside nor outside 
the station w'as there anyone w^aiting. 

“That’s just like the guv’nor,” said Jack. “He ex- 
pects us to walk; and that promises well, too; for it shows 
he does not mean to make a stranger of you and to treat 
you with high politeness.” 

The walk of tw'o miles was not unwelcome to Ethel. 
The exercise warmed her, and the exhilarating breeze that 
poured down from the moors brightened her eye and gave 
a deeper glow to her cheek. A small anxiety crept upon 
her that when she appeared in the Parkin halls she might 
look blowsy. But she enjoyed the w^alk, and laughed 
heartily with Jack at the dozen solemn rooks walking 
silently in the rear of a ploughman, who was drawing out 
the fragrant furrow; they were sleek and clerical, and 
pounced with avidity on the helpless worms. 

But this walk was not to end so pleasantly as it had 
begun. The Fate that always begrudges poor mortals the 
happiness they set their hearts on, put it into Jack Parkin’s 
head that he had better avoid the public way of the village 
and the front of the vicarage, whert) he might encounter 
someone who would make him feel awkward in Ethel’s 
company, and to take instead a path by the fields round 
the churchyard. They were within a few yards of the 
point where this path entered the Parkin grounds, when 
round the corner of the little church, on their right, ap- 


123 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


peared a young lady, tall, and dark, and handsome. Ethel 
found a quick searching look from her large dark eyes flash 
upon Jack, and then centre in herself, and at the same 
time she saw that the young lady had abruptly stopped as 
if she would draw back. 

“ Damn!^' exclaimed Jack under his breath, while he 
blushed an overpowering red. He lifted his hat, however, 
as he passed; the young lady inclined her head and turned 
away. 

“ Who is it. Jack?'" Ethel asked, quietly, though she 
felt she knew, and could have screamed, or burst into tears 
with a wild instinct of jealousy. 

‘‘ Who is it?" echoed Jack, lowering a little. “ Cardi- 
gan's sister, of course — Miss Cardigan." 

Nothing more was said, but Ethel felt lonely, and help- 
less, and sore. They walked along a fine avenue of chest- 
nuts, which were just showing promise of buds, and reached 
the hall door of a square roomy mansion, built in the bar- 
barico-Greekish style, which was in vogue when George the 
Third was king. Jack.rang the bell; the maid that opened 
the door said that Mr. Parkin was not in the house; he 
was “ out about somewhere." 

“Will you wait here, Ethel?" said Jack, showing her 
into a room, which she guessed would be called the library, 
because of the book-case against one of the walls. 

While Jack was gone to find his father, she sat and med- 
itated uncertainly on this her first visit to a house which 
would probably some years hence be her home. She felt 
very much a stranger; if she could well have done so, she 
would have gone out, and run back to her father. Would 
the old man she was waiting to see be rude to her? What 
would he say? While she thus timidly tried to forecast 
what was before her, and to reassure herself that she would 
be the object of warm affection, she unconsciously moved 
nearer the fire, as if to make herself at home by the family 
hearth. Under a big arm-chair she then noticed a pair of 
large slippers, and began at once to speculate concerning 
them. They were «toutly made of the leather called pig- 
skin. They were old, yet they looked as if they would 
wear for years to come. They were creased; they had a 
depression at the toe, over which the sole was inclined to 
curl; they were evidently in the habit of being occupied by 


A REVEREHD GENTLEMAI?’. 


123 


feet that did not fill them, and were no doubt the property 
of a man (they could never have belonged to a woman!) 
who thought more of durability than of beauty, of comfort 
than of appearance. And who could the man be but Jack^s 
father? And there, too, were his spectacles by the book 
on the table, and the book was a Bible. At once she im- 
agined the room as it must have been two or three hours 
before; she saw breakfast cleared away, and the servants 
glide into the room, and sit on those chairs by the wall, 
while the old man, in those large uncompromising slippers, 
came to the table, and read reverently (though probably 
with little art) from the great book. This picture sug- 
gested, by way of contrast, another — in the parlour of the 
little Welsh parsonage. Here also the breakfast is being 
cleared away, but no servants come in to morning prayers, 
though the household is that of a clergyman; instead, the 
master, a neat, slim gentleman of middle age — her father 
— is left alone in his old flowered dressing-gown, and his 
natty worked slippers, toasting his toes at the fire, and 
sniggering over “ Tristram Shandy.^’ The old man. 
Jack’s father, who had sat in that library, was surely good; 
and what was the occupant of the parsonage parlour — the 
gentle, cultured, cynical gentleman who was her father? 
Was he bad? For the first time she was seriously impressed 
with the thought that perhaps he was not quite what he 
should be — even to her. But the impression had no sooner 
touched her heart, than it was effaced with a suffusion of 
shame and dread — shame that she should have been 
tempted to think ill of the dear daddy, who had been fa- 
ther and mother both to her, and dread of her own inclina- 
tion to be suspicious. 

But the door opened, her heart sank and then rose almost 
into her throat, and the next moment her little hand was 
in the warm, nervous grasp of a very sturdy, upright, bald 
old man, who was saying, “Well, how are yon?” The 
tone was shy and gentle; she let her eyes rest inquiringly 
oil his face, which was instantly transformed from some- 
thing of wooden impassivity, with a blush worthy of a boy 
and a smile of singular sweetness. He gave her hand an- 
other little pressure before he released it with a little shy 
laugh; and from that moment Ethel understood him and 
began to take possession of him. 

“ So you’re the girl,” said he, sitting in his arm-chair 


124 


A KEVEUEND GENTLEMAN. 


and preparing to endue himself wiih his slippers, “ that 
made my scape-grace fall in love all in a week?’’ 

“ No, not a week!” exclaimed Ethel, now at ease with 
herself. “ Was it only a week? I— I believe it was.” 

Only a week!” laughed the old man. “ Yes, you little 
gipsy, only a week. I suppose you thought it was about 
six months or six years— eh?” 

” Well, I have known Jack — I seem to have known him 
— for quite six years.” 

“ We were great friends, you know, father,” said Jack, 
“ when I was at school. Ethel used to beg me off punish- 
ment and field for me, and all that sort of thing, you 
know.” 

“ Ah, yes. Humph!” said the old man, slipping into 
his wooden manner, a characteristic of which was an auto- 
matic jerkiness of the head when he talked. “ AVell, now, 
I suppose you’re hungry?” smiling again on Ethel. “ We 
won’t have dinner for half an hour yet. You’d better 
have a glass of wine and a biscuit; Jack, 3^011 know where 
the port and sherry are.” Jack rose and left the room. 
The old man leaned towards Ethel, and in a low, hurried 
voice, and with delightful shyness of manner said, “ You 
must keep him up to the mark; he’s a rascal.” 

“ Oh, Mr. Parkin!” exclaimed Ethel. 

“ I mean he’s idle, and he likes his own way too much. 
I’ve been too easy with him; you must keep him up,” and 
he tugged at imaginary reins, as if Jack were a lazy horse 
that needed a constant “ mouth-reminder ” that he was on 
the road. “ Keep him up,” repeated the old man, nod- 
ding and smiling his peculiarly sweet smile. 

Jack returned with the wine and biscuits. Ethel said 
“ No, thank 3mu ” to both. 

“ Nothing?” said the old man, rising. “ Have a bit 0’ 
parkin.” He went to the small sideboard and produced a 
piece of the famous Yorkshire cake. Ethel took a little. 
“ Ah,” laughed the old man, ” is that all? I suppose you 
think you’ll have had enough of Parkin by the time you’ve 
done. Ho, ho! Well, now, come and see my green- 
house. ” 

” Oh, yes,” said Ethel; “it is so long since I saw any 
flowers.” 

“ Is it, now?” said he, considering her. “ Well, now, 
you shall have some.” 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


125 


“ By Jove!^^ exclaimed Jack, aside to her, as they were 
entering the greenhouse. “ You are in favour!’^ 

Etliel was delighted with the beautiful array of blossoms. 
She exclaimed, “ Oh, isnH it delicious?^’ as she put her 
bright face close to a flower of transcendent beauty and 
scent; she prattled of the verbenas, the calceolarias, and 
even the orchids which, once upon a time, adorned the 
home at Hampstead, which Jack could remember. She 
named with regret the fine fuchsia-bush which grew in the 
garden of the little Welsh parsonage, now abandoned for- 
ever; and she and the old man became unaffected friends. 
He cut some of his choicest blossoms for her, and insisted 
that she should fasten them at her bosom; and then he 
looked at his watch and said it was time for dinner. 

Over dinner (which was served in the large, cold dining- 
room, the walls of which were covered with oil-paintings 
chiefly remarkable for their frames) Jack was rather silent 
and discontented, as he had been (Ethel had jealously 
noted) since the appearance of Miss Cardigan in the 
churchyard. The ale did not please him; he would rather 
have drunk a light wine; and the beef was too much 
cooked. 

‘‘ Nothing of the soi»t!” exclaimed his father. Ethel was 
surprised and rather frightened to see how very obstinate 
and angry the old man could look. 

“ Y'ou know something of orchids, father,^^ said Jack, 
“ but you know nothing of cooking. 

“ Humph!” exclaimed the old man, getting very red. 
“ You do, 1 suppose! — at your father^s expense!” 

“ Well, father,” said Jack, with an irritating laugh. 

“ Hold your tongue! You’re a fool! You don’t know 
what’s good for you!” 

Ethel sat pale and trembling; a rupture seemed immi- 
nent. But Jack smiled, rather sourly, perhaps, but still 
smiled, and the gust of quarrel sank as suddenly as it had 
risen. 

After dinner the old man set before Ethel a plate of fine 
grapes which he had locked away in the sideboard, while 
he himself satin silence and smoked, regarding Ethel with 
an indulgent eye. Jack lit a cigar and fidgetted about the 
window. 

“Why don’t you offer. Jack,” exclaimed his father, 
suddenly, “ to show her round the grounds?” 


126 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


Jack threw off a careless gesture, expressive of his readi- 
ness to show, if Ethel cared to see, the grounds. 

“ Come, my dear,"" said his father, jumping up and lay- 
ing his pipe on the mantel-shelf, “ I think I can show you 
what there is to be seen. "" 

“ Come along. Jack,"" said Ethel, rising with cheerful 
alacrity; “ let us all go together."" 

“ You’re a good girl,” said the old man, as he and she 
passed out in the rear of the lordly Jack. 

The grounds were attractive and well kept. All grass 
edges were trimmed, the bushes were lopped of superfluous 
wood, while, with a true sense of forestry, the trees were 
let alone, except that all about them the soil was loosened 
and broken open to the influences of the air and sunshine 
of spring. 

“ I do most of the work myself,"" said the old man. 

“Yes,"" said Jack, “ the guv"nor has for years turned 
himself into a day-labourer without wages."" 

This careless flout brought back the obstinate wooden 
look to his father’s countenance. 

“Ah, but,"" said Ethel, “it must be so nice to work 
about among flowers, and bushes, and trees, and feel as if 
they knew you were good to them, and were grateful."" 

“Yes, that"s it,"" said the old man, with a ready, de- 
lighted conviction of the truth of this which encouraged 
Ethel to proceed. 

“i remember reading in a little American book father 
is very fond of, something like this:— ‘ Fondness for the 
ground comes back to a man after he has gone the whole 
round of pleasure and business. The love of digging in tlie 
ground is among the last, as it is among the first, of our 
delights; it is as sure to come back to a man as he is sure 
to go under the ground and stay there." "" 

Ethel stopped short, blushing at her temerity in attempt- 
ing so long a quotation, while Jack looked at her in some 
surprise. 

“ That’s true— very true,” said the old man. “ A little 
book your father likes, eh? I should not have thought 
that. I suppose 1 can buy it? A little book, eh? — and 
not dear, then, I suppose?” 

With a stumpy pencil, on the back of an envelope, he 
wrote the title of the book; and by-and-bye they returned to 


A REVEREKD GENTLEMAN’. 1^7 

the house, and when they had had a cup of tea it was time 
to return to Scarborough. 

At parting, Ethel said, with all her heart, “ 1 am so 
glad you asked Jack to bring me to see you.'’ 

The old man looked tenderly at her, gave her arm a 
caressing little pinch, and blushed very much. She im- 
pulsively raised her face and kissed him. Quick tears 
sprang to his eyes; he turned and looked down, and said 
abruptly: “ Jack tells me your father is going to London; 
when — if he does go— -you must let me be a father to you 
then;" and before she could say anything in reply he was 
gone. 

“ I can't think. Jack," said she, as they walked down 
the avenue, “ why you made me think that your father 
would be very terrible. He seems to me the dearest, 
nicest old man." 

“ You haven't lived with him," answered Jack, with a 
laugh. “ You've known him only for two or three hours. " 

“ Yes, dear; but 1 think I understand him. He needs 
only management." 

Jack looked at her; could this be the girl, unversed in 
stratagems and wiles, of whom he had made easy conquest 
through her fond simplicity? Might it not be (the suspi- 
cion would return) that with all her manner of transparent 
thought and purpose she might be " deep — might have 
been “ deep" with him? That was her father’s character, 
and might it not be hers? 

“ Well, my dear," said he, “ manage him by all means; 
you'll have opportunity enough." 

He turned aside a moment to light a cigar; then they 
walked on in silence by the way they had come, rather hur- 
riedly, till they were past the churchyard and the village, 
while Ethel was anxiously alert lest that handsome, tall 
Miss Cardigan should show herself again. 

When they reached Scarborough a surprise awaited them. 
When the train drew up, Ethel had barely set foot on the 
platform, when she was locked in the arms of her sister, 
Kate. 


128 


A REVEREKD GENTLEMA15r. 


CHAPTER XXL 

KATE'S ARRIVAL. 

The sight of Kate (whom he recognized at once from 
her extraordinary likeness to Etliel) both surprised and 
disconcerted Jack. He had certainly given a glance now 
and then — he cannot be said to have considered it — at the 
probability of her turning up in Scarborough since Merrydew 
had read her letter from Wales; but he thought of it as an 
event of that vague future when all disagreeable things are 
expected to happen; it was detestable to have it accom- 
plished before his eyes without any warning. He rapidly 
bethought him that she could not have been many hours in 
Scarborough; how much then did she know? He glanced 
at Merrydew, who was anxious to catch his eye. 

“ It’s all right, so far,” said the parson in an aside, 
whilst his daughters were still engrossed with each other. 
“ We must keep them from saying much in case— Kate, 
my dear,” said he, turning and laying his hand on that 
young lady’s arm, “you haven’t yet paid your duty to 
Jack, your brother-in-law of the paulo post future.” 

“ How do you do. Jack?” said she, somewhat precisely, 
giving her hand, and at the same time a look of scrutiny 
which did not seem suspicious only because it was reserved. 

“ She has come all the way from the land of Taffy to- 
day, in the company of George Cardigan,” said Merrydew, 
“ arrived not much more than hour ago; lucky 1 was in 
to receive her. But we couldn’t stay indoors — must come 
to meet you.” 

“ Father,” said Kate, “ thought it would be nice to give 
you both a surprise. ” 

“ Yes,” said he, “ the nicest of all things to say ‘ how- 
de-do?’ unexpectedly. Now, Kate, you walk on with 
Jack and tell him all about your journey; I want to have 
a talk with Ethel about her visit to-day.” 

“ But, father,” objected Ethel, “ I want to talk to Kate; 
1 have so much to tell her. Suppose you walk on with 
Jack.” 

But this was not what Merrydew desired at all. 

“ Well, my girl,” said he, “ the pavements are not very 


A RE^^EREND GENTLEMAN. 1:39 

crowded; suppose we walk all four abreast, aud Kate can 
tell us her adventures. 

“I've told you them already, father," said Kate. 

“ I can bear to hear them again, my dear." 

So they walked away to the South Clilf over the lonely 
bridge (which is all the lonelier because of its half-penny 
toll) and Kate told what story she had to tell. 

It amounted to this: An appraiser and auctioneer had 
been found who took everything at a valuation (including the 
cow and the pig, and excepting the old secretary, the books, 
the easy chair, and the other things which Merrydew had 
desired should be kept back), and he had given Kate for 
her father a cheque in settlement for £60. (“ The uncon- 

scionable thief!" exclaimed Merrydew, at the same time 
thrusting his hand into his bosom to feel that the cheque 
was safe in his waistcoat pocket. ) Mr. Cardigan had been 
very nice and kind, and had given great help in packing 
the reserved things and seeing them taken to The Turk's 
Head, where they were now waiting to be sent on by train 
to London as soon as the word should be given. AVhen all 
that had been done, and Miriam had gone home to her 
family, the poor little parsonage looked very desolate. 
(“ Dear little house," said Ethel, shedding a tear or two. 
“ After all, we were very happy there — weren't we, fa- 
ther?" “ Yes, my dear," said her father; “ but 5/6? tran- 
sit, you know. And I don't think we have left any roots 
of our affections there; there has been no snapping of heart- 
strings, eh? What do" you say. Jack?" Jack only 
grunted.) Kate had then gone to The Turk's Head, 
intending to remain till she received her father's orders. 
Mrs. Evans had been very kind, and Mr. Cardigan had 
been very “ nice." But at the end of the week the unin- 
telligible Welshmen had again been roused to resentment 
by the continued comment of their unintelligible news- 
papers upon the Reverend Mr. Merrydew's outrage. They 
had come and assailed The Turk's Head with stones and 
clamour, and demanded that the parson's goods and the 
parson's daughter should be given up to them. (“ The 
insolent ruffians!" exclaimed Merrydew.) But Mr. Cardi- 
gan had been very kind and brave: he had gone out to 
them, and with the help of two or three of the constabulary 
who turned up, had driven them away. He then pro- 
posed to Kate that, since he had settled to go homo on Mon- 


130 


A Hm^EREND GENTLEMAlC. 


day, she should travel under his escort, and seek her father 
ill Scarborougli. (Both Jack and Merrydew thought them- 
selves much obliged to the intrepid George for this, and 
Merrydew said so.) That they might be in time for the 
train at Oswestry on Monday morning, they went on to 
Clwydd on Sunday, and spent the night there. (Just as 
we did,^^ said Ethel. Jack also exclaimed at the coinci- 
dence, and felt it as another reason for resentment against 
the alliance into which he had been led by his own similar 
conduct. He began to nurse it as a decided grievance that 
George had not been so “nice in honour as himself, for 
he did not suppose that George had offered to marry Kate.) 
Thus they marched up to their lodgingi, looking linked in 
purpose and sympathy as in person. Even after they had 
disi»arted company, they did not appear to fall away from 
the delightful contact of spirit, though Merrydew was in a 
stew of dread lest something the next moment should pre- 
cipitate a revelation. When they entered the sitting-room, 
a cheerful fire burned, which drew Kate immediately into 
its warmth, and drew the others after her, for it was cold, 
and the dusk was settling very thickly. Kate had been 
known at home as “ Cinderella from her fondness for 
taking a seat on the fender, and from the absent, princess 
air with which she picked cinders with her fingers from the 
hearth to insert in glowing fissures in the fire. Taking off 
her hat and jacket (while Merrydew feared she might wish 
to withdraw with Ethel), she handed them to her sister, 
and sat down in her favorite ])osition. 

“ I suppose I may?^^ she said, glancing from her father 
to Jack, as uncertain which was master in the lodgings. 

“ Certainly,” said Jack. “If you would like a seat on 
the man tel -piece, I should be pleased to help you up; you 
would look well there.” 

Jack had been piqued by Kate^s steady air of knowing 
and not liking him — piqued into the assertion of his lighter 
and more attractive self. He began this, as young men, 
mistakenly always do begin such a i)urpose, with chaff. 

“ What, with my feet dangling down?’^ said Kate. 

“Yes, my dear,” said her father, with a little forced 
laugh, “ with your feet dangling down. ” He scarcely knew 
what he said. He was wondering how on earth the immi- 
nent discovery of the relations between Ethel and Jack 


A REVEREI^D GENTLEMAN. 131 


could be averted. Recollectiug himself, he added, “ You 
would look well anywhere, my dear. 

“ Oh, father, even as a mantel-shelf ornament?^^ 

“ Kate,’^ said Jack, “ does not like the notion of being 
put on the shelf. But she needn^t be afraid; she is one of 
a handsome family. Oh, yes, I mean it,^^ he added, in 
answer to an inquiring look from her. 

“ Yes, Jack, my boy,^^ said Merrydew, still in a flutter, 
“ that^s true, since you joined us, and ‘ handsome is as 
handsome does,^ you know. 1 hope, and — and believe we 
shall be a happy family as well; I do. Come, Kate, why 
don't you say something pleasant on — on this auspicious 
occasion?’^ 


“ Why, father,^ ^ said she, “ we are not rehearsing 
speeches for the wedding breakfast, are we? I do, 
though,^^ she continued, rising on the impulse, and laying 
her hand on Jacks’s arm, “ most truly hope that you and 
Ethel may be very happy. ” 

“ Thank you, dear,^^ murmured Ethel, who had just 
re-entered. She went and kissed her sister, and they both 
cried a little and laughed a little, and then said they were 
silly things, and sat down, one on either end of the fender, 
and looked at the fire. 

Jack was touched, but uncomfortable. 

“I’m sure,” said he, impulsively, taking a seat on a 
hassock near Ethel, and putting his hand on her shoulder, 
“ it will be altogether my fault if we are not.” 

Kate gave him a frank look of appreciation. 

“ Nobody,” he continued, feeling he had touched a satis- 
factory chord, “ can ever quite forecast the future. But 
Ethel and I understand each other, I think, in spite of our 
short acquaintance this time, and we shall get on very hap- 
pily.” (And he, no doubt, believed it at the moment.) 
“ 1 have not been very good, perhaps; I never had a 
mother to look after me; but Ethel is going to be my 
wife and my mother all in one. ” 

“ Do you think,” said Kate, “ it is quite fair to expect 
any girl to be all that?” 

“ Perhaps not,” said Jack, willing to please. “ I ho])© 
— I tljink — I shall not need her to act much the part of 
mother.” 

“ Young people,” said Merrydew, “ must find out for 


m 


A EEVEEEND GENTLEMAN. 


themselves how much they can help each other; it is not 
for others to tell them or to teach them/ ^ 

“ But 1 shall/’ said Ethel, abandoning herself to the 
satisfaction of the moment, and caressing the hand on her 
shoulder, “ be both mother and wife to Jack as well as 1 
can. And you, Kate, must be all his other female relations 
rolled into one — his sister-in-law, and his mother-in-law, 
and his sister, his cousin, and his aunt. 

And they all laughed, and were tenderly suffused, as with 
the gentle glow of the fire-light, with the unanimity and 
placidity of hope — while Merrydew had a counter sub- 
suffusion of dread of the revelation that must ensue. Was 
there no way to avoid it? He could think of none. 


CHAPTER XXll. 

Kate’s discoveey. 

Peeseetly the gas was lit, and the table was laid for 
dinner, and by-and-bye they sat down to eat and drink. 
Merrydew was not in talking mood, and the others were 
somewhat infected by his example. Yet he was anxious 
that they should continue talking of indifferent matters, 
so as to keep away from the central subject of his anxiety 
— which, indeed, so oppressed him that he was ready almost 
to blurt it out and have done with it. 

“ This is very much seaside fashion,” said he, “ four in 
one sitting-room for meals and all.” 

That was an unfortunate utterance. Kate at once 
caught it up. 

“ I suppose,” said she, glancing at Jack’s position at the 
head of the table, and thinking of his general bearing as 
master of the purse, “ I suppose Jack took these rooms. 
Did he come here before you?” 

“ Er — yes,” said her father, now in a fluster, “he did 
— a little.” 

“ Lodgings should be cheap,” she continued, generally; 
“ the place can’t be overdone with visitors at this time of 
year.” 

“ Have you asked the landlady, father, for a room for 
Kate?” said Ethel. 

“ No— no, my dear — not yet. Pd better do it when she 
comes up.” And he inwardly called himself names of im- 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. iSB 

becility for not having thought of that so necessary point 
before. 

“But why/^ demanded Kate, promptly, “need we go 
to that extra expense? Can’t I sleep with Ethel?” 

Though both the men had been expecting something to 
turn up which should precipitate a disclosure, when it came 
it took them at unawares. Jack was overcome with the 
deepest blush he had ever experienced (men don’t blush as 
he did then oftener than twice in a life-time); he looked 
intently into his plate. Ethel, opposite Kate, glanced at 
Jack, and blushed almost as red a rose as he. Merrydew 
was simply silent (he had long done with blushing), and 
fascinated into watching the suspicion of the truth dawn- 
ing in his clear-seeing daughter’s eyes. Kate was for a 
moment or two bewildered by the phenomena which she 
witnessed, then she understood, and was covered with a 
blush reflected from her sister. 

“ 1 think, my dear,” said Merrydew, breaking in upon 
this pause of dreadful embarrassment, “ we had better ask 
Mrs. What’s-her-name to find you a room. To-morrow or 
the next day Ethel, I daresay, will have to begin to be 
very busy trying on dresses, and — and all that sort of thing, 
and getting them to fit, and it will no doubt be better that 
she should have her room to — to herself.” 

“Ethel,” said Kate, without looking at her father, 
“ will be better with me than without me. 1 can help her 
about her dresses, and 1 suppose it will be the last time we 
shall occupy the same room. So, please, don’t trouble 
Mrs. What’s-her-name.” 

The young lady said this in a quiet, resolute tone, which 
plainly intimated that she had looked at the matter with 
her clear eyes, and had seen what was to be done, and that, 
therefore, no more need be said. Merrydew looked at 
Jack, and caught his eye. 

“ I don’t suppose,” said the young man, “ my view of 
the matter is of any consequence. Still, I may say I don’t 
see why you shouldn’t do as Kate suggests; it will at least 
save you the rent of another room.” 

Ethel alone kept silent, and looked wistfully, and as if 
without understanding, from one to another. 

“ Don’t you want me to be with you, Ethel?” asked 
her sister. 

“ Yes, dear,” she answered; and that was all. 


134 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


So dinner passed, and they rose and sat about the fire. 
The landlady when clearing away the last trace of the meal 
ventured to remark it was a beautiful night — ‘ the moon 
as bright as day.'’^ Then all, glad of some distraction, 
went to the window and looked out. Jack, stirred with 
soft, unselfish thoughts, and perhaps a little urged by a 
troublesome desire to seem as worthy as possible in the eyes 
of the clear-seeing sister of Ethel, proposed to take the 
latter for a walk along the cliffs. Then it was natural 
that the others should propose to go with them. 

“ ITl bring your things down, dear,^’ said Ethel to her 
sister, quitting the room. 

Then Merrydew took the opportunity to say aside to 
Jack, “ I suppose it doesnT matter much now, but if there 
are any things of yours in that room, it may be as well to 
take them out.^^ 

“ Oh,^^ said Jack, “ it’s all right; I don’t care.” 

Out in the moonlight, the feelings of all were subdued 
and softened. How could it be otherwise, since human 
nature is what it is — neither very bad nor very good in 
itself, but terribly or delightfully open to influence — and 
since physical nature in its supreme loveliness witches the 
souls of men and women so that, through the mystery of 
pure beauty, they are compelled to believe in a mysterious 
power of goodness? The shimmering sea, dotted with here 
and there the sail of a fishing-boat, lay softly heaving as 
with the breath of life, and murmuring in soft ripples in 
the wide entrance of the cliff -bound bay. Away to the 
south, far beyond the southern horn of the bay, flashed out 
now and then the eye of the Flamborough light; in the 
north rose the craggy bulk of the castle cliff, with the 
ruined fragment of the keep on its shoulder; behind that the 
old church, with the churchyard in which poor little Anne 
Bronte lies buried; and down in the lee of the cliff, sloping 
to the shore, the red roofs of the old town, calling to mind 
its lingering traditions of Robin Hood and Richard of the 
Lion-heart — this all flooded and transfused by the mellowest 
and most enchanting moonlight. 

They returned from their walk with something of this 
mellowing and etherealising influence in their hearts, with 
what was good in each heightened, and with a disposition 
to overlook or to excuse what was not so good in each 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 135 

other. If they could only have kept this moonshine all 
through their lives! 

Ethel and Kate went to bed, while Merrydew and Jack 
remained in the sitting-room, to smoke a pipe and to drink 
a glass of whisky and water. The sisters had not had the 
opportunity for months of exchanging confidence. They 
now drew up the blinds and let the moonlight into the 
room, that they might lie awake for a long time and see 
each other while they talked, with the innocent delight of 
school-girls. Had you been privileged to overlook their 
bed you would have guessed without much previous knowl- 
edge which was the stronger-charactered of the two. Ethel, 
with her hair loose, lay in Kate’s arms; Kate, with her hair 
in a long plait, her more resolutely beautiful face, with its 
larger mouth, and her firmer flesh, so far as it was dis- 
closed, looked much the stronger. 

“ Tell me all about it, dear,” said Kate. “ How did 
you come to meet Jack?” 

Then Ethel told of the appearance of Jack and his friend 
before the Glyndfrdwy parsonage. How long ago? Why, 
not much more than three weeks ago! Was it not strange? 
But it seemed only an intimacy resumed after a long in- 
terval of waiting; she had never quite forgotten Jack from 
the time he left school, and during their stay in the strange 
loneliness of Wales she had remembered him a good deal. 

Kate, by skillful questions, drew forth the details of the 
few days of sweet intercourse, which culminated in that 
long Saturday journey begun when she herself was on the 
way to Glyndfrdwy, and, clear seeing as she was, and 
knowing more of men and of the world in general than her 
sister, she made up her mind as to one or two things. 
First, that her father — no doubt with the simple desire of 
furthering Ethel’s prospects in life — had encouraged this 
intercourse rather more than was becoming. Second, 
that Jack Parkin, whatever might be his intention now of 
a legal union (and probably he was generous enough to seek 
to make amends for his dishonorable inveiglement of a 
simple, loving girl), had won Ethel for the mere gratifica- 
tion of a selfish passion. These conclusions led her into 
some anxious speculations. Was it likely that a married 
life thus entered upon with haste, and probably with re- 
gret on one side, at least, would be a happy life? Did all 
men love after this greedy, carnal fashion? This was a 


136 A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 

dark and terrible doubt for the maiden still “ fancy-free!'^ 
Would not any wretched singleness be better than to be 
the object of such a love as that? “ Let me," she 
thought, “ grow old and withered, and cold and cheerless, 
rather than love a man like him!" 

There was thus a silence of some minutes, which per- 
plexed and pained Ethel. 

“ Tell me, Kate dear," she whispered; “ do you blame 
me very much? 1 loved him so, and only wanted to please 
him; don't you understand, dear?" 

“ I know, 1 know, my dear," Kate answered, caressing 
her. “ If any person blamed you, my darling, it would 
only be because they do not know my sweet, pure sister, 
with her great loving heart! My beautiful, darling sis- 
ter!" 

And Kate hugged and kissed her, while her indignant 
heart sent hot tears to her eyes, as she thought how foolish 
and wicked people ipight misunderstand, and cry “Fie!" 
upon Ethel's conduct. 

“ Do you think I'm nice, dear?" said Ethel. “ I want 
Jack to think me nice." 

“ [Nice, my darling!" exclaimed Kate, kissing her again, 
“ of course you are nice. " She had a mind to add, “ Too 
nice, I think, for him," but she did not. 

I have not the smallest doubt but that many people who 
do me the favor of reading this will, in spite of what I have 
tried to show throughout my narrative, obstinately main- 
tain to themselves that Ethel yielded so readily to Jack's 
importunities out of the abundant wantonness of the female 
heart, and not from the pure womanly desire to surrender, 
to sacrifice anything and everything to please the man she 
loved. Even respectable fathers, like Ethel's own, the 
reverend gentleman then sniggering over his whisky and 
water, and respectable sons, like his companion, will per- 
sist in thinking so, and think the author a fool for pretend- 
ing the contrary. I am inclined to marvel at this, till 1 
remind myself that men like the Reverend William Merry- 
dew or Mr. Jack Parkin have had a great want in early 
life; the arid and besotting influence of merely male 
society at school and college has not been corrected arid 
purified by the constant distillation upon their spirits, while 
at home, of the holy dew of the love of wife or mother. 
Such men may have a wide desultory acquaintance with 


A KEVEKEKD GEKTLEMAE-. 137 

women, but they do not understand woman. The man 
who has studied one good book thoroughly is wiser far than 
the man who has read a whole literature superficially. 

The sisters talked on about other things till they heard 
Jack Parkin go to bed in the little room next them, 
when they became silent. Soon Ethel went to sleep, but 
Kate remained wakeful. Her thought and fancy were 
active with that alertness which is aroused by wakefulness 
in the early hours of the night. Her attention was still 
centred in her sister’s singular situation. She had a 
strong suspicion that Jack would not make her a good hus- 
band; might it not be better for her sister, after all, not to 
marry him? — but to go away with her and her father to 
London, where, surely, they could all contrive to live hap- 
pily]^ But would her father hear of that? would Ethel 
herself, who seemed so fond of the man, agree to it? She 
could not believe that either would listen to any such pro- 
posal; so things had better be left to their course, and the 
future permitted to take care of itself. Futures, she knew, 
had a habit of evolving their products with small reference 
to human predispositions, and so she fell asleep. 

Kext morning before breakfast she had an unlooked-for 
collision with her father on the subject. She came down 
before Ethel, and found Merrydew already in the sitting- 
room, scanning with his glasses the columns of the “ York- 
shire Post.” She had barely greeted him with a dutiful 
kiss when the landlady entered and said : 

“ Mrs. Parkin has sent me a message, miss, to ask you 
if it’s tea or coffee you take. ” 

“ Mrs. Parkin?” she wondered for a moment who that 
was, and then she flushed a blinding red before she could 
answer the woman. When the landlady was gone she 
turned to her father. 

“ Oh, father,” she cried, ‘‘ how could you have let it 
happen like this? How can she get married decently and 
openly after living here as Mrs. Parkin?” 

“ My dear,” said he, rather pettishly, “ I expected I 
should hear some reproach from you about this awkward 
business of Ethel — I suppose that’s what you allude to. 
There is no good crying over spilt milk; the jug’s broken, 
and the milk’s on the ground, and the ground doesn’t mind 
a bit. I didn’t want Ethel to go flying over the coun- 
try to compromise herself with Jack, you may be sure. 


138 


A KEVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


But since the thing is done there is nothing to be gained by 
making mouths and glum faces, and uttering nasty words 
over it. They’re all the fonder of each other, I believe, 
for their little escapade; and ’pon my word, I don’t know 
but that a young couple would be always better for begin- 
ning their married life with a taste of the Sabine method.” 

‘‘ Father!” 

“ My dear, you’re young and a girl, and don’t know 
anything about it. Jack is going to marry Ethel, she’ll 
be in a very comfortable position; the old man, I believe, 
is worth a mint of money. So 1 would particularly im- 
press upon you, my dear, the desirability of being as kind 
and sisterly with Jack as possible. Why should we make 
his marriage a sort of penitential ceremony for the young 
man?” 

“ 1 don’t want to see him do that sort of penance, fa- 
ther. Indeed, if it were not that Ethel is so fond of him, 
1 think it would be very much better if he did not marry 
her.” 

“ I hope, my dear,” said he, suddenly perceiving how 
this daughter might disturb the smoothness with which 
I kings were gliding on toward the point he had planned 
and feared for-— “ I hope you will not take upon you to 
svy anything like that — anything to interfere with the mar- 
riage!” 

“ If I said anything disagreeable,” conceded Kate, “ it 
would probably only give pain to Ethel.” 

“ I’m glad you see it could do no good, and I hope you 
will be pleasant with the young man.” 

“ I can’t promise, father. I can’t at present feel so 
easy and forgiving about it as you seem to do. It was 
dreadfully selfish and dishonorable of him, and it makes 
one think — ” 

“ Think what? — what now? — what?” 

“ Well, father — that he had got it into his head that 
whatever happened, you wouldn’t mind much.” 

“ You’ll say next, 1 suppose, girl, that 1 encouraged 
such a view.” 

“ He certainly wouldn’t have dared, father, to do as he 
did with a girl he met in society.” 

“ You’re impertinent, Kate,” said he, with some heat; 
f )r he winced under her reproof. “ It may be true that I 
do not inspire respect as a man and a father; if is true, for 


A EEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


139 


I do not inspire you with respect; but you should be the 
last person to tell me so; you would be the last person, if 
you had the smallest tincture of affection and gratitude. 1 
have always made companions of my daughters; I have 
allowed them the extremest latitude of behaviour and 
speech; and when an unfortunate result arises to one of 
them from that I am covered with reproach. It is perfect- 
ly natural, I suppose; 1 have brought it on myself by let- 
ting you become so doosedly familiar. 

“ Forgive me, father,^’ said she, approaching him peni- 
tently; she had perhaps been too uncompromising in her 
reproach. 

But her father was still too warm to grant forgiveness; 
and further speech was interrupted by the entrance of 
Ethel and Jack. 

Merrydew was depressed and distraught all breakfast 
time. It was very painful to him to be at variance with 
any one, much more to be at variance with one near him. 
8o much did his tiff with his daughter trouble him — the 
daughter who would henceforward probably be his all, who 
would have to be his stay in his metropolitan adventure — 
that he took the first opportunity for a reconciliation. 
AVhen Jack and Ethel had withdrawn after breakfast, he 
promptly approached Kate while she was making up her 
mind to renew her appeal for forgiveness. 

“ Kate, my dear, we mustn^t quarrel; there are only we 
two left now. We both want to see done what is best for 
Ethel. Her happiness now turns on her marriage; let us 
see that out as brightly and nicely as we can.’^ 

“Dear daddy!^^ she cried, kissing him. “ YoiFre a 
nice, wise little father, and I"m a silly, impatient girl.'’^ 


CHAPTER XXHI. 

PROSPECTS OF FORTUNE. 

The next few days went to all appearance so smoothly 
and pleasantly that Merrydew was glad he had “ had it 
out^" with Kate; “ it cleared the air,^^ as he declared to 
himself. Time passed quickly; for there was much to do. 
As ample a bride^s outfit as could be compassed had to be 
provided; for Mr. Parkin had sent Ethel for that purpose 
a cheque for one hundred pounds, and a pleasant little let- 


140 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


ter, in which he said he would like her and her husband to 
stay at Sherborne for some time at least after their mar- 
riage. To this Jack demurred a little; they must go to 
Scotland for a wedding trip; that was the place to spend a 
honeymoon. The matter was compromised by an agree- 
ment to abridge the “ moon to three weeks in Scotland, 
after which they would settle down for a while at Sher- 
borne. Then Jack had to go to York to secure a special 
licence. All marriages by special licence shouM be quiet; 
this marriage ought to be, for more reasons than one, 
quieter than common. It was arranged that the couple 
should leave their present lodgings as for their railway 
journey, and that when the ceremony was over they should 
drive from the church straight to the railway station. 

On the great day, having sent their luggage on before 
to the station, Ethel and her sister with great palpitation. 
Jack with the air of having been married a great many 
times already, and lastly Merrydew, with a manner of 
much impressment, as became a clergyman, mounted into 
a roomy fly from the Crown Hotel, and drove to a certain 
street corner. There they got out, and, telling the fly- 
man to wait, walked up the hill to the church. On the 
pavement outside they encountered Parkin senior, carrying 
a bouquet of very fine, but ill-arranged flowers. Ho wore 
a very shiny hat and a gorgeously flowered satin waistcoat, 
which had probably last adorned his person at his own mar- 
riage or at Jack^s christening. He blushed very much, 
and laughed his little mechanical laugh when they came 
upon him. His first greeting was for Ethel. He smiled 
his smile of strange sweetness, and presented his bouquet. 

“ There, my dear,^^ said he — “ some of the flowers you . 
like. I picked them myself; you can arrange ^em nicely 
afterwards. Not much of a turn-out for a wedding — is it? 
— and no spread either. Never mind, my dear — and he 
patted her shoulder — “ we’ll have the spread and the cake 
when you come back.” 

The poor girl could say nothing in reply. Her heart was 
in her throat. She smiled, and looked as if she would like 
to cry. 

Then the old man greeted Merrydew and Kate with a 
“ How are you?” and his regulation little laugh. It was 
characteristic of the relations of father and son, that the 


A EEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 141 

old man took no notice of Jack at all, and Jack took no 
notice of him. 

The pew-opener was on the look-out for them, and 
ushered them to their places. During the reading of the 
marriage-service, the old man was solemn, and wooden, 
and entirely self-possessed, while the others were each more 
or less in a fluster. Ethel was in a whirl of strange excite- 
ment and expectation, as if the ceremony were to work 
some magical change in herself and Jack, to bring some 
sublimity of blessing and satisfaction to herself in being 
the wife of Jack. She saw the clergyman in his white sur- 
plice, with the book in his white hands; she heard, “ Do 
you take this woman and “ Do you take this man?^^ she 
let the ring be put upon her finger; she was kissed by 
Jack, kissed by Kate, who was in tears; kissed by her fa- 
ther, and kissed by Mr. Parkin — and that was all, except 
that presently she had to sign her name with a very shaky 
hatid — her old name, “ Ethel Merrydew ” — for the last 
time. Then they left the church, Ethel somewhat sur- 
prised that she felt not very different from what she was 
before. They walked back to their fly, in which Ethel and 
Jack were about to drive away by themselves, when Mr. 
Parkin got in with them. 

“ I^m going home,^^ he said; “ I may as well get the lift 
to the station. 

Let it be chronicled of his quaint kindness, and as mark- 
ing the singular fondness he had set up for his daughter- 
in-law, that before the station was reached he produced 
from his breast-pocket, with a blush and a smile, a sha- 
green case, which he put in EthePs lap. 

“ They were Jack’s mother’s,” said he; “ they must be 
yours now.” 

In this way Jack and Ethel set out upon the wedded life 
which had been introduced to them so distractedly: Jack’s 
father returned, meditative, to the lonely halls of Parkin; 
and Merrydew and his sole remaining stay walked back 
leisurely to the lodgings on the South Cliff. 

Kate was in very low spirits; she liked this marriage less 
now that it was accomplished than even when it was in 
prospect. She kept declaring to herself, “ It is not, nor it 
can not come to good.” Merrydew himself was half- 
ashamed of having been concerned in it; it seemed to him 
a shabby, scamped sort of ceremony at the best. But at 


142 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN". 


present he had the sure consolation of cash. He had 
turned his cheques into notes and gold, and reckoning up 
all his money — the proceeds of the cheque Kate had 
brought from Wales, the remains of her salary, and what 
was left of the fifty pounds he had “ borrowed of Jack 
Parkin — he was the possessor of one hundred and twenty 
pounds odd, which was not indeed a fortune but was a very 
comfortable sum to a middle-aged like him. 

■-' What can not be done with one hundred and twenty 
pounds? With it one may taste for five minutes the gam- 
bler^s delirium over cards or roulette; or one may eat and 
drink and otherwise live in a loose forgetfulness of the mor- 
row for a whole week. On the other hand, with one hun- 
dred and twenty pounds, plus energy and astuteness (and 
if a good pinch of unscrupulousness can be thrown in it is 
all the better) a man may entrench himself against all the 
assaults of Fortune, and win the praise and the worship of 
his contemporaries. With one hundred and twenty pounds 
in cash, on the Stock Exchange a ruined Rothschild or 
Grant may retrieve such glory and honor as delight the 
soul of the plutocrat and the Jew; with one hundred and 
twenty pounds Prince Florizel of Bohemia, when ousted 
from his kingdom, may retire to the fragrant and serene 
obscurity of a cigar divan. With one hundred and twenty 
pounds judiciously laid out, a man may buy almost any 
new sensation he may set his heart on — he may even, if he 
should think it worth his while in these latter days, feel 
what it is like to be a Member of Parliament. With one 
hundred and twenty pounds a poet {qni nascilur non fit) 
may experience the delight of seeing and letting his f riehds 
see his sonnets or ballades in dainty printed garb; a novel- 
ist may publish his own novel and secure all the profits; 
arid any man with a turn for grocery and an acquaintance 
with printers may set up as a publisher and secure satis- 
factory results for himself. One hundred and twenty 
pounds, indeed, was the very sum with which Werdet — the 
worthy, unfortunate Werdet — made himself the sole pub- 
lisher of the great Honore de Balzac. 

But Merrydew wished to set up neither as a tobacconist, 
nor as a publisher, nor as a Rothschild or a Grant; nor 
was he a poet or a novelist with a manuscript waiting the 
apotheosis of print, nor a politician with a screw to turn 
or an axe to grind. He had his aptitudes and his aims, 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


143 


but they were not of these; they were more intimate and 
humaue. He desired above all things that William Merry- 
dew should have the means always handy for the gratifica- 
tion of those appetites and tastes which in him were natu- 
rally nice as well as keen, and which an enforced abstinence 
had touched with an ideal promise of delight and satisfac- 
tion. At fifty he was as eager as a neophyte to taste all 
the pleasures which life kept in her lap as well as those 
which she held in her hand. A new era opened for him; 
one daughter was provided for, and the other was able to 
do more than provide for herself, so that he might begin a 
metropolitan career with no responsibilities, and with a 
fair round sum to take him part of the way. He might 
begin at once to be fastidious in his eating and drinking, 
fastidious in his dressing, fastidious in his reading, and 
fastidious in his acquaintance, especially, like Charles 
Lamb, in his women and children — which last fastidium 
would, of course, preclude his being a parson in a poor 
parish, or a denizen of poor lodgings. 

“We can afford, my dear,^^ said he that afternoon when 
he was proposing to the reluctant Kate that they should 
celebrate Etheffs wedding by a nice little dinner at the 
Koyal Hotel — “ we can afford, my dear, to spend without 
anxiously counting the coppers. We shall not be always 
dining at Royals or Star and Garters; but even if our ex- 
penditure averaged a guinea a day we have enough in hand 
to keep us going for four months. And, of course, as soon 
as we get up to town you will find some teaching to do, and 
I — I shall settle down to literary work. 1 shall call on the 
‘ Pall Mall Gazette " and the ‘ Saturday Review;" Fresh- 
wood is sure to give me a turn, and ‘ The Saturday " is 
always on the look-out for new pungent pens. Why, Dilli- 
more used to make a good thousand a year out of ‘ The 
Pall Mall," and attend to his parish work as well."" And 
he put his hand in his pocket and paced up and down the 
room, as if he already felt his hundred and twenty grown, 
by monthly accretions, to a thousand. 

“ That would be nice, father,"" said Kate, quite won 
over to the suggestion of a dinner at the Royal; for she 
had a serene belief in her father’s literary faculty. 

“ I shall make a considerable something too,"" he con- 
tinued, now inspired to prophesy, recklessly, “ out of the 
comedy I have long been thinking of arranging from 


144 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAK. 


‘ Tristram Shandy. ’ A successful play in these days 
means a mint of money, and ‘ Tristram ^ can be made a 
deliciously delicate comedy; I am certain it would take.'' 

“ 1 daresay it would, father," said Kate; “and if you 
know any book in the world you know that. Oh, I should 
like to see the play produced — and to hear the people cry 
‘ Author! Author!' and then see you, after a modest sort 
of delay, led on by the manager to make your best bow, 
you dear old daddy! I, of course, would be in a private 
box with Ethel — with Mr. and Mrs. Parkin — and what 
theatre shall it be? I should only let a good theatre have 
it." 

“We shall see, my dear — we shall see." 

And so they went, in the brightest of spirits, to have “ a 
nice little dinner " at the Eoyal, and arranged to set off to 
London the next day in quest of this brilliant fortune. 

But next morning came a letter from the elder Parkin, 
brusquely inviting them — “ if they liked " — to stay for a 
few days at Sherborne. After some discussion the invita- 
tion was accepted. 

“ The old man is an old savage," said Merrydew, “but 
I have no doubt he means kindly enough. " 

“ Why, father," said Kate, “ I thought him yesterday a 
very dear, shy old man. " 

“ Oh, yes; he's got a shy manner sometimes; but he is 
the roughest and most uncompromising of bears. He was 
very rude to me once or twice over Jack's scrapes at school. 
If he thinks a certain agricultural implement a spade he 
calls it a spade without any ado." 

“ Well, father," urged Kate, “ that's better than call- 
ing it, like the man you've told me about, a something 
shovel. " 

“ It is — it is. And I have no doubt he means well in 
his rough, direct way. So we'll go." 

They went, and were very hospitably entertained by the 
old man. He took very much to Kate, as he had taken to 
Ethel. 

“ You’re very like your sister,” said he, the very first 
day, at the midday dinner; “ and yet you're not like. 
She's a good girl — a very good girl." 

He cut for her the finest blooms of his flowers, and the 
choicest bunches of his purple grapes, and put them shyly 
before her, as a boy might in the devotion of his calf-love. 


A reverend oentleman. 


145 


He even rendered a kind of homage to Merrydew; he lis- 
tened respectfully to his talk and laughed with an exhila- 
rating enjoyment at his racy stories (his raciest the parson 
did not tell), and produced for his delectation a very an- 
cient and cobwebby bottle of port. But it was pretty evi- 
dent that these attentions were paid not so much because 
the parson was of any account himself as because he was 
the father of two good and charming daughters. 

“ You have two fine girls— good girls, Mr. Merrydew, 
he said — “ better girls than most you come across nowa- 
days. 

“ They have been well brought up and cared for, Mr. 
Parkin; I have made companions of them from child- 
hood.’^ 

“ Humph!” said Mr. Parkin; but it was not clear 
whether he meant to disparage the principle of making 
companions of children or to doubt if such companionship 
had had much to do with the results he praised. Merry- 
dew was inclined to believe the latter, and therefore he 
made up his mind to maintain his old opinion about Mr. 
Parkin. 

Before they left, a small event occurred of some interest 
and consequence: George Cardigan, having discovered that 
they were staying at Sherborne, called one afternoon and 
informed them that he too was going to London. 

“ I am going to settle down to read for the bar and eat 
my terms. Mr. Quick is an old friend, a college chum, of 
tlie guv’nor’s — you’ve heard of Quick, of course — well, 
I’m going to him.” 

“ The law is a very good career,” said Merrydew, in his 
friendliest tones; now that Ethel was safely married, he 
forgave the young man all his misdemeanors. “ I believe 
I should have done better as a lawyer myself.” 

“ It’s not too late to begin, sir,” said George. 

I might interfere with your chance of the woolsack, 
my lad,” said Merrydew. “But when do you go to Lon- 
don to start your wild career?” 

“In a fortnight. I suppose you are going soon— to- 
morrow? I should like awfully to be going with you;” 
and he glanced at Kate and blushed. 

“Yes,” said Merrydew; “ now that Ethel is married 
and gone on her wedding trip, there is nothing to keep 
us.” 


146 


A REVEREKD GENTLEMAN. 


“ Oh!^’ exclaimed George, with interest, “ she is mar- 
ried then? Ihn glad; that's all right." Then, seeing he 
had blundered into an awkward form of congratulation, 
he blushed again, and added hurriedly, “ Of course I knew 
she was going to be married." 

“ Of all the hobby-de-hoys I've ever known," exclaimed 
Merrydew, when he was gone, “ I think he is the clum- 

S10S t ^ 

“Hobby-de-hoy, father?" cried Kate, warmly. “He 
is shy and simple, but he is not a hobby-de-hoy! He is a 
nice, good-natured young gentleman." 

“ Oh, he is — is he?" said her father, with a twinkle and 
a smile that made her blush. 

That evening, in the Cardigan family circle, George, we 
may be sure, let out the news of Jack Parkin's marriage, 
and “ things," no doubt, were said; but no echoes of them 
reached Merrydew *s ears. Next day, which was Friday, 
he and his daughter bade farewell to the halls of Parkin, 
and took train for London — and not too soon for the par- 
son's comfort; for certain gaunt and rapt Pl3nnonth Breth- 
ren (whom Merrydew confounded with the iShakers) had 
come to take melancholy possession over Sunday. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

IN QUEST OF FRIENDS. 

Considering the depth of Merrydew's purse, and the 
magnificence of his prospects, he was no doubt justified, 
when he reached King's Cross, in accepting the proffered 
aid of the hotel porter waiting to look after clients’ lug- 
gage, and in crossing to the Great Northern Hotel straight- 
way. He excused himself for this to Kate by declaring 
that they would go and seek suitable lodgings the very next 
morning. For quietness' sake (at the same time promis- 
ing himself that he would make up soon for his abstinence) 
he ordered as economical a meal as was to be had, which 
delighted the anxious, thrifty mind of his daughter. She 
knew her father's talent for spending, and she troubled 
him with her evident solicitude, lest the hundred and 
twenty pounds should have melted away before an income 
could be established. 

Next morning, before breakfast. Kate was intent with 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


147 


her note-book and pencil upon the columns of the 
“ Times/^ wherein such advertisements as “ Wanted, a 
Governess, to instruct three young ladies, etc,’^ are wont 
to appear. It was neither holiday-time nor the end of 
term, so there were very few governesses wanted. She was 
closing her note-book with a sigh, when her father ap- 
peared, and saw what she was doing. 

“ By the way,"^ said he, “you will not, of course, my 
dear, take another resident situation.'^ 

“ Why not, father?"^ said she. 

“ Oh, my gir], we can^t think of being parted now there 
are only us two. No, 1 can^t think of that. Certainly 
not; we must stand or fall together, and, by Jove! I think 
we shall stand — stand and climb, hey, my girl?^^ 

“ I hope so, father. Indeed, I think so. But what 
must 1 do? I can’t be idle. 

“We shall find you a non-resident place or a visiting 
engagement of some sort or another, never fear. AVhat- 
ever you do, my dear, don’t worry, for goodness’ sake; it 
takes all the sap out of your nerves and the stiffness out of 
your back. Now let’s have breakfast, and then we shall 
go and look for rooms, and you can settle down and ar- 
range a little home for us at once.” 

“ And I shall manage to make it look very nice, you 
shall see, father, when we get our own few things from 
Wales; and by-and-bye we shall have a little house of our 
own again, father, sha’n’t we? You know I think it very 
dear and good of you to decide that we shall stay to- 
gether. ” 

“ Bless you, my child!’’ 

It was a matter-of-fact benediction. It did not strike 
him that the girl manifested noble unselfishness in rather 
girding herself for the future— a future with him— than 
lamenting the past, the loss of home, which he had so 
wantonly caused. 

After breakfast they sallied out into the Euston Eoad; 
there they paused, while Merrydew beat his leg with his 
cane, and looked at his daughter as if he were debating a 
point with himself. 

“ We must have something respectable and roomy,” 
said he; and he looked this way and that, as if trying to 
decide upon the rival claims of Pentonville and Bloomsbury. 
This was merely an affectation, for he had already made 


148 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


up his mind, but he did not like to say so. “ And/^ he 
added, seizing a new point, “ I should be near the Mu- 
seum; 1 must go to the reading-room a great deal.^^ 

That was decisive, and they walked toward Euston 
Square. 

Bloomsbury is one of the pleasantest, cheapest (all things 
considered), and leafiest districts of this great London 
which we have built, and which (maugre Mr. Morris) is 
the healthiest, the most delightful, the most rural-in-urhe 
of all the great cities in this or any other land. The sol- 
emn repose of Bloomsbury, the quiet of its squares and 
places, the solid comfort and amplitude of its houses, the 
hospitable width of its doors, and the weight of its knock- 
ers, have fascinated the lively and intrepid sons and daugh- 
ters of Israel, who invariably know a good thing when they 
see it, and who have taken such possession of Bloomsbury 
that flippant persons calls it “ The New Jerusalem. 

In Bloomsbury, then, in Woburn Place, the Reverend 
William Merrydew said, “ This will do,^^ as he looked round 
a large and comfortable sitting-room and a bedroom on the 
ground floor. It was by a kind of afterthought that a 
bedroom was found for Kate — the second floor back. For 
these three rooms Merrydew bargained to pay two guineas 
a week, a price which made his daughter pull a long face. 
In another hour they were in possession, and Kate sat 
down to write to Ethel. They had a chop each for lunch, 
and then Merrydew announced to his daughter that he was 
going out; that he was going to look up some old friends, 
and that he probably would not be home to tea or any 
other meal that evening. 

Once out on the broad, smooth pavement, he marched — 
he marched. He had an abounding sense of freedom and 
power, this young man of fifty. Was he fifty? He began 
to doubt it. He congratulated himself that he, he of all 
men, had undying youth. He felt younger, fuller of life, 
and freer than he felt at thirty-five. He was now alone 
and unencumbered, with all great London before him, 
with the passion of life within him, and with money in his 
pocket to gain its fulfilmoRt. His passion of life was one 
of active achievement as well as of passive enjoyment, 
which should impel every man who is not a dull fool. 
This desultory walk along familiar ways, with fresh feel- 
ings, to end with a choice little dinner at a good restau- 


A EEYEREND GENTLEMAN. 


149 


rant, was the enjoyment he had had in view ever since his 
arrival the day before at King’s Cross. He had told his 
daughter he meant to look up some old friends; that was 
not true; he wanted no friends that afternoon, with their 
impertinent, careless questions and talk; he was his own 
friend, and he intended to enjoy his London by himself 
during the splendour of those spring hours — to challenge in 
silence, as he noted the wealth of the shop windows, and 
the sumptuousness of the equipages and of the pavement 
throng westward, the fulfilment of the magnificent prom- 
ise she held out to men of energy and obstinate endurance. 

In this mood he perambulated Oxford Street, Regent 
Street, the Burlington Arcade, Piccadilly, the Row, and 
then back, in the declining afternoon, up Piccadilly. As 
he passed along he was a noticeable figure. More than one 
person turned to glance after him. He wore nothing dis- 
tinctively clerical but a white neck-tie; yet that, with the 
friendly smile shed freely around, and his pace, which was 
quicker than is common in the West End of an afternoon, 
made most observers, no doubt, take him for a simple, be- 
nign country parson in town for a holiday. Arrived at the 
Circus, he crossed and entered the Cafe Monico, regardless 
of the gaily caparisoned ladies of foreign extraction there-’ 
about who invited his attention. He ordered a glass of 
Vermuth, sat for a little while, and talked with a dark- 
visaged stranger, and then took his leave and went to din- 
ner, well satisfied with his afternoon, thinking he had for 
a little felt the pulse of civilised mankind. He found 
Kettner’s, and prepared to expand in its festive savours. 
For a moment he had a carking vision of his daughter sit- 
ting solitary in the Bloomsbury lodgings; but to do him 
justice it must be allowed he would have brought her to 
Kettner’s if she could have brought herself to the simple 
enjoyment of Kettner’s cookery, without tasting with every 
dish its expense. 

His dinner was good, and he enjoyed it ah ovo ad 
pomum. This, however, the unwary and unaccustomed 
should observe, was not due altogether to Kettner. Merry- 
dew brought one ingredient of a good dinner with him — 
experience; he knew what dishes delighted in each other’s 
company; and he brought, too, the prime essential of en- 
joyment — appetite; for two days he had nursed and tickled 
it into piquancy. 


150 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


He was at the height of his enjoyment; his face shone 
with the glass or two of wine he had drunk, when he ob- 
served enter the sallow and somewhat greasy foreigner of 
the Cafe Monico. He smiled and waved a light recogni- 
tion, upon which the foreign gentleman bowed and ap- 
proached. 

“ May I, sehr, sit with you?^’ 

Merrydew did not resent his evident desire to scrape ac- 
quaintance. He had none of the shy reserve which com- 
monly afflicts the educated Englishman, and any natural 
suspicion he might have had of the advance of a stranger 
and foreigner was allayed by the generous fare he was en- 
joying. 

“ Certainly, sir,^^ said he; “I shall be pleased if you 
will.^^ 

They soon were conversing very agreeably. The for- 
eigner showed himself to be a man of considerable informa- 
tion and adventure. He was an Italian of Milan, where 
he had carried a musket, though a mere lad, in the cele- 
brated “ Five days.^^ After that he had fought against 
the Austrians, and become a serjeant-major of horse, under 
Charles Albert, whom he called scelerato.-’^ Later still, 
he was one of Garibaldi’s Bed-shirts. Now he was virtuoso 
and dealer in antiquities; in pursuit of his business he 
passed often to and fro between England and France and 
Italy, a fact which accounted for the curious mixture of 
tongues he used to express himself. With the frankness 
which sits so well on a foreigner, he informed Merrydew 
that he was “ bachelor,” and he presented his card (his 
name was Carlo Bottiglia), and said: 

“ If you like to call one day, I shall be pleased to show 
you many nice t’ings.” 

Merrydew could not but thank him, and at the same 
time present his card, on which was displayed the parson’s 
style and degree — “ Bev. William Merrydew, M. A.” 

“ Ah, si!” exclaimed Signor Bottiglia, gazing at the 
card. “ Per Bacco ! By chove! Excuse me, sehr — but 
I always read ‘ The Daily News ’ — I am Liberal, you know 
— and two — free weeks ago I read a letter about a Bev- 
erend Merrydew fat read — ah, si drole ! — the very funny 
work of Sterne in his church. Excuse me; am I mis- 
take?” 

“ No, signor,” said Merrydew with a smile, “ no mis- 


A KEVEREKD GEiq’TLEMAK. 


151 


take at all; Pm the person — the parson, I should say — the 
unfortunate culprit, the corpus delicti. It would seem 
I’m a notorious man. Well, perhaps, it was an improper, 
a foolish thing to do,” he continued, with the air of a boy 
talking of a scrape. 

“ Oh, selir, why?” interrupted the signor. “ It is good; 
it is drole. It is what you say, ‘ boy will be boy.^ I do 
not go to church, but I would go then. ” 

“They should not,” said Merrydew, “have put the 
temptation in my way by making me have a service in En- 
glish where nobody knew English.” 

With this their talk became more friendly and intimate. 
Signor Bottiglia remembered he had a standing invitation 
from the manager of a neighboring theatre of varieties; 
did Mr. Merrydew incline himself to go? So they went 
together to the neighboring theatre, and saw “ varieties ” 
of person and performance. And then, having had more 
than one glass of something with water — water still and 
water sparkling — they parted with effusive protestations of 
good-will, and Merrydew took a cab to Woburn Place. 

“ What a long time you have been, father!” said Kate, 
rising, weary and anxious, from her seat by the fire when 
he entered the room. “ I expected you in to supper.” 

“ Yes, my dear,” said he; “ but I could not help it; I 
met a man — a very agreeable man — and we dined. ” It 
was difficult to tell from her look whether she altogether 
believed him. “It has been lonely for you, my girl, I 
know. But, look here, to-morrow is Sunday; you shall 
come out and dine with me — I dare say they would not, in 
any case, give us dinner in the house here.” 

“But, father, we can’t afford to go on dining out and 
paying the big rent here!” It was an appealing plaint, it 
was evidently not the product of the moment. 

“ Oh, my dear,” answered he, tenderly, “ one dinner 
more or less can not matter much. And we shall settle 
all the better to hard, steady work if we allow ourselves a 
bit of a fling to begin with. A horse pulls all the better 
at the plough after a day’s frolic in a pasture.” 

So Merrydew took his daughter to dinner, and felt the 
score was balanced for his solitary indulgence the evening 
before. 

In the sober reflection induced by Sunday he admitted 
to himself that it would have been wiser if he had not dined 


152 


A REVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


at Kettner’s, and become so easily intimate with the Ital- 
ian. However, it would be very easy for him not to con- 
tinue the acquaintance; it would even be necessary, since 
Carlo Bottiglia was not a person likely to be of any use to 
him in his project for fame and fortune. 

Monday, therefore, found Merrydew, with the recollec- 
tion of Signor Bottiglia almost wiped out, climbing a stair- 
case in the Temple. He paused on a landing (where it 
always seemed to be late in the afternoon when it was not 
night) before a door, from the midst of which gleamed 
upon him a brass plate with the name “ Jopling.^’ It was 
a familiar name to the parson. Jopling had been one of 
his college intimates; Jopling and he had lent each other 
French novels, had walked together arm in arm by the 
banks of Cam, and had indulged in mutual confidences 
concerning women; in post-college days Jopling and he had 
met frequently at first, and then more and more rarely; 
more and more the lines of their life had diverged, till 
Merrydew was what we know him, and Jopling, still a 
bachelor, nominally a barrister, was the learned author of 
certain voluminous “ Treatises ” concerning the Church 
in the Middle Ages, and the editor of an awful Quarter- 
ly,^’ over which old fogies knit their brows in the clubs, 
and young fogies with a passion for heavy reading went to 
sleep. After a little, a young man opened the door in an- 
swer to his knock; he sent in his card, and presently was 
before his old intimate, who sat at a writing-table, bur- 
dened with papers. 

“ Sit down a moment — will you?” said Jopling, without 
looking up or offering his hand. “lam finishing a letter 
I must send to post. John, wait and take this with you. ” 

So Merrydew sat down and waited, with his hat on the 
top of his umbrella, and with the uneasy heart of a client. 

When the letter was finished and sent off Jopling twisted 
round, crossed his legs and locked his hands, and looked 
at his old chum. 

“ Now, Mr. Merrydew, what can I do for you?” 

This sudden and merely ofificial demand disconcerted the 
parson, and made him a trifle deprecatory. 

“ Well, Jopling,” said he, “ having thrown up my liv- 
ing in Wales — ” 

“ Humph!” said Jopling, turning and closing a drawer. 


A REYEREKD GENTLEMAIST. 


153 


“ Say rather, your living in Wales having thrown yoii up. 
We know all about it: a most unfortunate affair. 

“ I suppose you read that letter in the ‘ Daily News?’ I 
don’t think that tells you all about it. ‘ Audi alteram 
'partem,'* you know, Jopling. ” 

“1 don’t see any need: 1 dare say the central fact is 
true? Well — that’s enough for us. Since that, we have 
had served up to us, too, in all the papers the story of your 
sudden flight from the place: that was far from agreeable 
reading for sound, loyal Churchmen like myself. At the 
same time, if 1 can do anything for you now that you are 
in town — ” 

“ Thank you. I thought that since you have so many 
influential acquaintances among the clergy, you might get 
me an occasional service in any of the London churches. 
My theological opinions — ” 

Are broad, 1 believe. But, if you will take my advice 
you will be known in connection with the Church no more. 
It would never do. At the same time — you used to have a 
clever pen — well, I shall keep you in mind, and if anything 
turns up in connection with my ‘ Review ’ I’ll let you 
know.” And Jopling put his hands on the arms of his 
chair, ready to rise. There was a pause. 

“ And that,” said Merrydew, “ is all you have to say to 
me?” 

“ I think that’s all,” said Jopling. , 

Jopling rose, and Merrydew rose, and looked at his old 
intimate with his clear, childlike eyes. But Jopling was 
in no wise embarrassed. He gave Merrydew one look — the 
cold, hard look of a stranger — and Merrydew went out 
without another word, while rage and disappointment 
swelled and rose within him. 

He felt as if he had been slapped in the face; and yet 
he had had nothing to say to the man. What could he 
say? Jopling owed him nothing — not even money. He 
had, indeed, helped Jopling to keep his head on the giddy 
points of mathematics in their early Cambridge days; but ' 
that is a service which a successful man easily forgets. 
Jopling, of course, as a dignified and important Church- 
man, thought he did well to be indignantly reseryed with 
a clergyman who had disgraced his cioth. Jopling — the 
stupid, respectable bullhead — might go to , might re- 

main in his successful mediocrity; there were other and 


154 


A EEVEEEND GENTLEMAN. 


worthier old friends than Jopling, and when the nan^e of 
Merrydew should be known and quoted (as it soon w’^ould 
be), and Jopling would seek to renew acquaintance Mdth its 
owner, Jopling would be ignored. 

Thus calming and encouraging himself, Merrydew 
marched from the 'J^emple to the Albany, and sent in his 
card to another intimate of former days. This was Tweed, 
a gentleman of easy life and fortune, who studied French, 
and believed he wrote English in his essays on dramatic 
and pictorial art in certain magazines. He received Merry- 
dew with effusive heartiness, laughed with him over his 
Welsh escapade (he, like Jopling, had heard all about it), 
and said he hoped they would meet often, now' that he was 
“returned to town.^* “ What was he going to do? — re- 
sume school-keeping?^^ “ No,^^ Merrydew said, “ he was 
going to try literature and journalism.^' 

“ Rather late to begin — isn't it?" said Tweed, survey- 
ing the points of Merrydew's figure, as if he had proposed 
to enter for a gymnastic contest. 

“ I have," said Merrydew, “ in a sense been practising 
all my life. " 

“ Well, I wish you all the success you can get." This 
was said cordially enough, but when Merr 3 'dew hinted that 
an introduction to an editor of publisher would be an agree- 
able service, a notable hardening passed upon the lines of 
Tweed's face. 

“Of course, with pleasure," said he; “ though 1 don't 
think, really, it will do you much good. What may be the 
line you will take up?" 

Merrydew intimated that he thought he was qualified by 
liking and experience to speak with authority on matters 
pertaining to the Drama. 

“ Yes," said Tweed; “ I see." 

He evidently wondered whether Merrydew had never 
heard of such a person as Tweed in connection with things 
dramatic, and whether it was only out of his simplicity he 
was proposing to deprive that person of part of the occu- 
pation of his days and nights; however, he sat down and 
wrote an introduction for him. Then he hoped that Merr}'- 
dew would “ some day " dine with him at his club, and 
meet some men he “ought to know." Merrydew ex- 
pressed his anticipatory delight, and they said good morn- 
ing- 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


155 


A good many years have passed since then, but that let- 
ter of introduction has produced nothing, save a suspicion 
in Merrydew’s mind of its bond fides, and that festive day, 
which he looked forward to for some time as likely to be- 
come historical, has not yet arrived. Perhaps Tweed 
never quite intended that it should arrive; and Merrydew 
began to think as much a week later, when he met Tweed 
lounging in Piccadilly, and that gentleman suddenly 
evinced an astonishing eagerness to hail and enter a pass- 
ing hansom. 

To have sought and thus found two old friends was 
enough for one day. The receptions he had met with had 
to be recovered from and thought over. They were excep- 
tional, he told himself. Jopling was bound in a pachy- 
dermatous respectability, and Tweed was encased in an 
easy-fitting but impenetrable selfishness. But these men 
were both bachelors: the stirrings of old friendship would 
probably rise more readily and briskly in the hearts of the 
fathers of families. So next day, and the next, he (in 
more desultory and hopeless fashion) tried to find such stir- 
rings, but with no greater success among the married than 
among the celibate. Who but an ingenuous youth like 
Merrydew would have ever expected it? A married man — 
unless he is possessed of great wealth or influence — must 
be even more economical than a bachelor in his friendship 
as in the rest of his expenditure of money, time, and at- 
tention. Moreover, Merrydew^s friendship with those who 
had known him for many years was under suspicion; he 
was known as a shifty, unsuccessful man, and his recent 
escapade (of which they all seemed to have heard) forever 
precluded his being openly recognized in any respectable, 
church- going society. One here and there, with charitable 
intentions, might ask him now and then to the family 
lunch or dinner; but even that would be felt to be beset 
with risk; for might not such an abandoned parson as he 
utter things of wicked import in the hearing of innocent 
women and girls? 

Merrydew recognised all this, after it had been thrust 
upon his attention by his search for friendship. To be 
eternally cut off, however, from the society of people who 
went to church, and took their meals, their exercise, and 
their sleep— all with comfortable regularity —was no pain 
whatever; but to be denied the aid of such men as Jopling 


156 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


and Tweed, which he had counted on in his schemes for 
fame and fortune, was a severe disappointment. 

A week passed, and fortune seemed farther distant than 
when he had stepped from the train at King’s Cross; for 
his cash was rapidly melting away — more rapidly than he 
cared to think of — and he had done nothing to replenish 
his store. He had thought of a good many things which 
might be done, but he had as yet put his hand to none of 
them. After dining one evening at Simpson’s (a good 
dinner in a public place was always to him a source of hope 
and inspiration), he took a seat at the base of the vacant 
pedestal in Trafalgar Square. While he sat smoking, a 
sprightly gentleman descended the steps, singing in a low 
voice a scrap of a well-known opera, and crossed the flags 
before him, twirling his cane. 

“Ah, Signor Bottiglia!” he cried, rising at once. He 
held out his hand, which was at once grasped by the lively 
Italian. 


CHAPTER XXV. 

AFTER THE HONEYMOON. 

We must for a little leave the Reverend William to im- 
prove his resumed acquaintance with Signor Bottiglia, while 
we see how the newly married pair are getting along (ad- 
visedly, we must use the plural verb; for no perfection of 
marriage will ever in this world make of two persons one 
identity). 

It might be interesting to some, but it would certainly 
be tedious to most, if 1 were to describe all the little turns 
and twists, recoils, and resumptions of conjugal love be- 
tween Jack and Ethel during those first weeks. We have 
already seen something of their conjugality before mar- 
riage, and we know that the ceremony in church could not 
alter its conditions very much. Novelists teach, and young 
people, I dare say, believe, that a young man and a young 
woman, after yearning for each other, and being kept apart 
by two volumes and a half of misunderstanding and machi- 
nation, and finally coming together in matrimony, live 
happy ever after — “ and so an end.” As if marriage were 
an infinite stretch of ethereal (if monotonous) bliss! as if 
through the gate of matrimony lovers pass from the 


A REVEREl^D GENTLEMAN. 


157 


troubles and toils of earth into a land of sunshine, of scent- 
ed groves, and singing birds, of purling brooks, and banks 
of sweet forget-me-nots. It is well for the individual as 
for the nation that marriage is not the end of life, but the 
beginning. Then dreams cease; and men and women, 
finding themselves bound to each other by an indissoluble 
nexus, awake and shake themselves. Then the blind open 
their eyes, the deaf hear, and the dumb speak. Then, for 
the most part, and not before — yes, even after what is 
called a love-match — the storm and stress of the heart 
begin, and many a precious article of freight has to be cast 
overboard, or, worse still, alas! the ship may founder with 
all on board. But these storms all true hearts will 
weather, with loss, no doubt — how much, or what loss 
neither friends nor neighbours nor even themselves may 
know — but they will be all the truer and tenderer for hav- 
ing encountered them. How many apparently devoted 
husbands of a few months^ standing, how many wives may 
have this very day had it almost in their mouths to ex- 
claim, “ I am tired of you; you are spoiling my life; our 
marriage was a mistake but have forced back the bitter, 
alienating truth, out of fear of the terrible effects its utter- 
ance might produce, and keep a smiling, love-like exterior. 

The trip to Scotland did not last so long as had been 
expected. The hotels were empty, and both masters and 
waiters seemed surprised at being waked up so soon after 
their winter’s torpor. In all places near the east coast a 
bitter dry north-easter blew; they went to the other coast, 
to the Firth of Clyde, and immediately the wind shifted 
into the west, and rain fell with the steady persistency and 
overwhelming gloom of a Scotch Sabbath. The young 
people, therefore, were thrown very much upon each other 
for distraction and amusement, a somewhat barren re- 
source at the best of times, when there is no distinct pur- 
suit or interest. 

“ People,” said Jack, “ should not get married in 
March — at least, if they get married, they shouldn’t take 
wedding-trips to this confounded country. There’s noth- 
ing to be done, nothing to be seen, at this time of year. 
We must just shiver and curse our time out, and then 
come away. ’’ 

“ Shall we go back at once, dear?” said Ethel, readily. 
She had got no enjoyment out of the trip, except the con- 


158 


A REVEREKD GENTLEMAK. 


staiit one of being with Jack. “ I am ready when you 
like. Yes; let us go: 1 know you’re tired of it, dear.” 

Jack, of course, protested that he would not cut her 
wedding-tour short; it was not the correct thing to do — 
but for all that she had her way, since Jack’s inclination 
was in the same direction, and in less than a fortnight after 
leaving Scarborough they were comfortably housed in Sher- 
borne Hall. 

There the time passed agreeably enough. Ethel and 
Jack’s father became fast friends. She helped him during 
the day in his gardening operations, which were then in 
full swing, and in the evening she sat between him and her 
husband by the fire. While they smoked or dozed (a re- 
laxation which Jack oftener indulged in than his father) 
she read a novel aloud. The old man, in spite of his re- 
ligious asceticism, preferred that kind of literature to any 
other, and Ethel was a pupil of her father in the art of 
reading. Sometimes, by way of change, she would sit 
down to the piano, and Mr. Parkin was delighted, whether 
she played well or ill. 

But this idyllic kind of existence in a very few days 
wearied Jack, who was bitten with an aimless activity. He 
set himself at first to rub up his mathematics, and to re- 
study some books on military strategy and engineering, of 
which he was the possessor. He had thus occupied himself 
for a week or so, without declaring even to Ethel his pur- 
pose, when one evening he suddenly opened on his father. 

“ Father,” said he, “I want to go in for the army — the 
engineers. I’m tired of hanging about.” 

“ Then,” exclaimed his father, “ why do you hang 
about? There’s plenty to do, looking after the place and 
the land. I want you and JSthel to settle down here, at 
home, as the gentleman and lady of the country-side. Go 
ill for the army, indeed! Why do you want to go in for 
the army now? You’ve got a wife, haven’t you? Does 
she want to go into the army?” And he looked suspicious- 
ly at Ethel, while sucking hard at his pipe. 

“ No, Mr. Parkin,” she answered, promptly. “ But — ” 

Her husband interrupted her. “ I dare say, if you agree 
to it, she’ll come round.” 

“ Well,” said the old man, “ I won’t agree to it. 1 
have always meant you to be a country gentleman. What 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


159 


else do you think I wanted to buy this big house and estate 
for?^^ 

“ Yes/ ^ said Jack; “but youYe not done with them 
yet.’"" He tried a more reasonable tone. “ DonH you see, 
father, that mygoiug into the army won’t hinder my being 
a country gentleman? Ethel and 1 will see the world for 
a few years, and then we shall come home and settle down 
to a bovine life contented.” 

“ Stuff and nonsense! See the world! You’ll only go 
getting into scrapes again, hanging about barrack towns; 
and, if a war should break out, going away from your wife 
to goodness knows where. I know you! I want you to 
settle down now that you are here. There, I’ll give up 
the house and estate to you at once; I suppose you’d give 
me board and lodging the few years I’ll be about.” 

“ Oh, Mr. Parkin!” exclaimed Ethel, struck with a 
vague commiseration. 

“ I don’t want to begin yet,” said Jack, ungraciously 
(he was of as obstinate a temper as his father), “ pottering 
about land and farm-buildings.” 

“ No,” said the old man, with a sad little laugh, “ you 
want to be off to have your fling again. I know you! 
Hold your tongue! You have been not more than a month 
or two out of the year with your father since you were 
born, and now that I thought you had at last come home — ! 
I won’t have it! You must stay here!” 

“ Very well.” 

And the son rose, white with anger, and went out; while 
the father sat staring at the fire, and sucking, sucking his 
pipe, till he found he was getting ashes in his mouth. 

From that night mathematics, military strategy, and en- 
gineering went on the shelf again, and the troublesome 
energy of Jack had vent in rides this way and that about 
the country, and over the moors. Then of a sudden his 
activity subsided. He was somewhere about the grounds, 
or the estate, or its neighbourhood, the whole day, though 
his wife, or his father, saw little or nothing of him, except 
at meals. How was he occupied? 

It is evident that the young heir of Sherborne Park could 
not get married, however secretly, and especially could not 
bring his wife home to the halls of his father, however 
quietly, without the facts being discovered and discussed 
by the gossips of Sherborne village. And if they were 


160 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


known by the villagers in general they could hardly escape 
being known by the vicar^s family in particular. This 
Jack Parkin perceived very exactly from the first day of 
his stay in his father’s house, though his father, for his 
part, considered the bearings of his son’s marriage so lit- 
tle, except upon the pair immediately concerned and upon 
himself, that he cannot be said to have perceived it at all: 
else, surely, he would have been less insistent about Jack 
settling down immediately at home. Jack, moreover, felt 
that to the village in general and to the vicarage in par- 
ticular his hurried marriage must appear a foolish one — an 
opinion which the young man resented, though it was only 
the reflection of his own. 

This then was one presentable reason why, during the 
first \veek or two, he was scarcely to be seen out-of-doors, 
why he wished to get out of the neighbourhood again, why 
he set himself to accomplish a regular and reputable pur- 
pose in life. His father having nipped in their bud his re- 
newed preparations for a military career, and he himself 
having got used to the thought of disagreeable general 
criticism of his marriage being without his father’s gates, 
he turned his attention to speculating what Miss Cardigan’s 
thoughts and feelings more especially were. His wife and 
he had, it seemed to him, said to each other all of any in- 
terest they had at present to say; suppose it were possible 
somehow to resume conversation with Miss Cardigan? 
Resume conversation? — no; he saw that could not be, 
yet — In short, not to inquire with him too curiously, one 
morning he rode out by a quiet back way to the moor. 
Miss Cardigan often rode alone on the moor. He rode a 
second day, and a third day, but saw nothing of a solitary 
horsewoman. Of course, the more he rode and did not 
see, the more he resolved to ride till he did see, the figure 
he looked for. 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

SWEETHEART AND WIFE. 

At length, one day, Jack came up with Eleanor, on the 
edge of the moor. He had been trotting briskly aloiig the 
side of a wedge-shaped plantation, and had just reduced 
his pace to a walk as he approached the point of the wedge. 
As he passed the last tree, he found himself in line with 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAIT. 


161 


Miss Cardigan. The horses whinnied to each other, and 
their riders could scarcely do less than salute. Jack Parkin 
was taken rather aback by the suddenness of the encounter, 
but he could not ride away. He glanced at Miss Cardigan. 
Her aspect was not forbidding; indeed, he had never seen 
her look brighter or handsomer. She did not seem at all 
troubled that he, the young lord of Sherborne, had forsaken 
her and married another, and that somewhat piqued him. 
She found her tongue before he found his — trust a woman 
for that. 

“ You’ve got your treacle-moon over, then?” she said, 
plumping directly in medias res, 

“ Yes,” said he. 

“ George told us,” she continued, “ that you were in 
Scotland. ” 

“ George told you!” 

“Yes; he called one afternoon while Mr. and Miss Mer- 
rydew were staying at the Hall; they told him. ” 

“ I see.” Upon which there was a pause, in which Jack 
reflected that the Cardigans could not then be so horribly 
offended after all. 

“ Enjoyed yourself?” asked the young lady carelessly. 

“ No much,” answered he, becoming more self- 
possessed. “ It was dreadful weather, and terribly slow in 
Scotland. So we did not stay long. ” 

“It’s better here — isn’t it?” 

“ Well — not very much. It’s very slow here, too.” 

“ Is it?” said she, quickly, giving him for the first time 
something of a searching glance. “ At any rate, I always 
think if you’re going to be wretched it’s better to be 
wretched at home; you can get away from people whenever 
you want to.” 

“ What?” exclaimed Jack, with a suspicion of lively sat- 
isfaction in his tone. “ Have you been wretched then?” 

“ Me?” she cried, with a delicious, self-caressing little 
laugh. “ What have I got to be wretched about?” And 
she flung him a careless glance of her bright eyes. 

“ Oh,” said he, “I thought from what you said — ” 

“ That I was wretched,” said she, catching him up. 
“ Oh, dear, no! I was only trying to condole with you.’’ 

And with another bright glance she nodded “ Good 
morning,” gathered up her reins, and galloped away down 
a side path. 


1G2 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


This little conversation was eminently unsatisfactory to 
Jack Parkin (as, 1 fear, it must be to the reader). 

“ IPs just as she always was with me,^^ he said to him- 
self as he paced aloug. “ There is no getting at her. I 
donT believe she ever cared twopence for me; I helped her 
to pass the time, and that was all. She doesnT seem to 
have any feeling. Yet a fine bright girl like her must 
have feeling — somewhere; there must be some way of get- 
ing at her. Perhaps another man can find it, if 1 canT. 
Then a very acute spasm of jealousy passed through him 
that another might succeed where he had failed. All the 
obstinacy and self-will of his nature were stirred; he could 
not, he would not endure it. If she could be made to feel, 
he would make her; if there was a way of “getting at 
her, he would find it. 

It may seem preposterous, but it is quite true, that while 
he was thus in the heat of his chagrin, he forgot that he 
was married, that he had now no right which society could 
recognise to make any woman feel but his wife. But he 
suddenly remembered, and brooded impatiently on it all 
the way home. 

It will surprise nobody to hear that, after this, these two 
frequently met riding on the moor, and greeted each other 
with “ What! you agaiii?’^ for the first time or two. There 
was no expressed assignation of meeting; there was scarcely 
even an understanding between them that they should 
meet; they were merely impelled together day after day by 
that “ Imp of the Perverse,^^ concerning which the great- 
est of American writers has written a nicely perverse little 
essay. It is a terrible “ Imp,’^ too little considered by 
psychologists, moralists, theologians, and such-like persons 
in their endeavours to account for the vagaries of human 
conduct, though it was evidently regarded as a factor of 
life by more than one sacred writer. Who was it that said, 
“ The good that I would I do not; and the evil that I 
would not that I do?^’ The more these two young persons 
felt they should not meet, the more were they attracted 
into meeting, till meeting became a habit, the one event of 
interest in each recurring day; for Jack Parkin had put on 
the shelf all other serious occupation, and Miss Cardigan, I 
daresay, had never had any other. 

Upon my life, to tell a story of human conduct, pointing 
out the circumstances, the impulses, and the motives which 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


163 


beget it and urge it on from point to point, becomes so 
difficult and intricate a business that I am often tempted 
to abstain altogether from “ considering, curiously,"’ and 
to act u^^on (he good old-fashioned maxim of story-telling 
that a man does a wicked thing because he is wicked, and 
a woman because she is weak. But then comes in the re- 
flection, “ I am not writing about wicked men and women 
■ — indeed, 1 have never known any — 1 am writing about 
men and women who are neither very good nor very bad. 
What then?” I am strongly tempted to accept the dogma 
of Original Sin to account for most vagaries of conduct. 
We are all becoming very educated, very civilised, very re- 
fined — we have much merely “ disinterested curiosity” — 
but we are all terribly subject to a most primitive, savage 
watering of the mouth, which we have inherited from 
“ the grand old gardener and his wife.” No sooner do we 
hear that there is some of the forbidden fruit about than 
even the soberest and best of us may be led away in search 
of it. And among the less sober and good, what a craning 
of necks to see it! what a haggard longing to taste it! 

To meetings on horseback on the moor, there soon were 
added, somehow, meetings on foot nearer home — in the 
secluded parts of the grounds of Sherborne Hall for prefer- 
ence. Meetings on horseback may be serious as well as 
cheerful; but meetings on foot are sure to become both 
serious and confidential. And when two young people like 
our Jack Parkin and Miss Cardigan become confidential, 
when they are near enough, and secluded enough, and yet 
still strange enough for a touch of the hand, and so forth, 
to be an experience— the situation is at a perilous turn. It 
would be difficult to say at what particular point wilfulness, 
pride, and selfishness in Jack Parkin reached their glowing 
heat, and amalgamated into passion. But until that point, 
it was a toss-up wdiether ho might not turn away — as he 
had turned before — and leave the maiden to her medita- 
tion, and, perhaps, still fancy free. But there came a day 
when it was manifest to himself and to her that they were 
so entangled each vviih the other, that passion now was the 
matter, and not jealousy, or vanity, or coquetry. 

It was an afternoon gladsome and fragrant with the 
warm, fresh life of spring-such an afternoon as too often 
helps to make the young reckless like the spring in seeking 
to fulfil all the heart’s desire. They met as usual, as if 


164 


A KEVEIIEKD GENTLEMAN'. 


without concert, in a sheltered little gully or glen on the 
extreme border of the grounds of Sherborne Hall, and they 
clambered up among the brambles and the bushes that 
clothed the gully side. They had to take hands in that, 
but — what was not necessary — they retained this hold of 
each other when their favourite seat was reached — a garden- 
bench, which had been placed under the summer shade of 
a spreading chestnut. There was, of course, no shade 
now, nor need of any, but such maguilicent promise of 
leafage as made the heart glad. 

“ Oh, how delicious those buds look!’^ exclaimed the 
young lady, looking up. 

“ replied Jack Parkin. “ Rather sticky.’^ 

‘‘ Oh, but they are beautiful, pure, opening things! 
They make me feel so sad, somehow! 1 wish I were a tree, 
or a dear little bunny, like that yonder, or anything but 
a girl! Oh, I wish,^^ she cried, with sudden vehemence, 
snatching her hand from his, and turning — “ I wish you 
had never come home again! AVheii you went and "got 
married to that girl why didn’t you stay away?” 

“ 1 couldn’t, Kell; you know 1 couldn’t,” he declared. 

“ It was very wrong to come; and it was very bad taste 
in her! Kow 1 must go away!” 

“ You go away?” he exclaimed, in genuine surprise. 
“ What for? Why?” 

“Mama says I have not been so well lately; she says 
I’.ve been restless, and disagreeable, and headachy, and so 
I must go to my aunt at York for a month. Oh — and I’m 
quite ready to go. I want to go. My aunt, dear old thing! 
is very good to me.” 

Jack Parkin was silent, but only for a few seconds. 
With a momentary glimpse of himself as he might be if 
touched with compunction, and with the self-denying grace 
of chivalry, he flung himself at once into decision; he had 
won her; he felt he had; would helot her go? Ko! He 
would bind her to him! Reckless of consequence, feeling 
only the passionate impulse and joy of the present, he 
turned to her. 

“Then, Nell,” he said, “if you go, I go with you. 
I’ve lost you once, let you slip from me once; I shall not 
do it again!” And he drew her and held her close to him. 

She was overpowered by his fierce caresses; but at length 
she recovered herself, and managed to draw somewhat away. 


A ReVErEnI) GEnTLEMAK. 


1^5 


^ “ Oh, Jack,” she cried, letting her cheek then drop on 
his shoulder, ‘‘ why didn’t you wait a little, and marry me? 
Oh, what am I saying? 1 don’t know what 1 am saying! 
] hate that quiet, mealy' iiiouthed chit of a wife you’ve got! 
1 thought, when I saw her in church last Sunday, ‘ That 
meek and mild girl made him forget all about me in a fort- 
night! What did she do, what did she say to make him?’ ” 

“ Nell, my darling, I have told you before how it was. 
I never forgot you— never really forgot you. You don’t 
understand how a man may take on a little — flirt a little 
with a girl while he is away from the darling he is in love 
with.” 

“ You should never have looked at her, let alone married 
her!” 

“ Oh, Nell dear, haven’t 1 explained how I was led on, 
trapped into the marriage? We were old friends, and that 
scheming old rascal, her father, was always asking George 
and me to his house, and then turning his daughter over 
to me;- and you know how, in the end, 1 was left alone to 
carry her out of danger, so that at last it was marriage, or 
a deuce of a row with her father and my own father! Oh, 
don’t you think 1 curse myself every day for havhig been 
such a fool? You must forgive me, Nell ! Say you forgive 
me ! I wish she was — ’ ’ 

“ Oh, don’t say that!” she cried, clapping her hand on 
his mouth. “ No; that’s too dreadful! Oh, yes, 1 forgive 
you, my dear; only don’t say that! It makes me afraid! 
But so long as you don’t love her, and love me always, I 
don’t care. Oh!” she cried, and drew away from him. 
“ What a wicked, wicked girl I am! Don’t touch me! 
Go away! I must go home!” And with that she fell to 
crying hysterically. 

But she did not go home then. Jack soothed and 
caressed her, and told her how they might still love each 
other, and no harm ensue; while she was away he would go 
to York every now and then, and meet her at a certain 
place, and no one w'ould be the wiser. 

And Eleanor Cardigan — God help her! — gave heed, 
though with trembling, and said she did not care, if so be 
Jack loved her, and always would love; and thus, upon the 
arm of another woman’s husband, with her eyes open, she 
began that “ descent of Avernus ” which the poet (con- 


1G6 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN* 


trary to the experience of the majority of mankind) de- 
clares to be so easy. 

How this pair would have been struck with astonishment, 
and with the remorse which comes from discovery — nay, 
more, how ominous it would have seemed to them I — could 
tlicy liave seen what was happening on the flat roof over 
the dining-room of Sherborne Hall, as they climbed out of 
the gully and crossed, somewhat closer than arm-in-arm, 
the space of turf between the gully and the larch planta- 
tion. 

* :Jc ♦ * ♦ ♦ 

Jack Parkings wife had just then come out of her room 
upon the leads, and seeing the sunlit country before her, 
and old Parkin’s spy-glass on its three-legged stand at her 
elbow, she turned to amuse herself by levelling i^ at any 
object in the landscape which might take her fancy. She 
had swept a considerable extent of country when she got 
tired of seeing nothing in particular. She removed her eye 
from the glass for a moment, and noticed something mov- 
ing steadily and slowly across a piece of grass near the edge 
of the domain. She brought the glass to bear, and the ob- 
ject resolved itself into a man and a woman walking very 
close together. She watched them, and the man became 
toiler — great heavens! — the presentment of herliusband! 
— of Jack! His coat, his hat, his height! And wdio was 
the woman? She looked again — no, she could not look! 
If the man was her husband, then the woman — Oh, the 
doubt, the fear, the suspicion, the raging hot jealousy 
which swept in upon her, and made her bosom a veritable 
hell of pain, till she smote upon it, and cried aloud, and 
then hurriedly entered her room, and flung herself upon 
the bed, and wept such scalding tears as are felt to be 
distilled from the blood of the heart! 

“ Oh, Jack, Jack! How can you? How can you?” 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

A SAFE I N V E S T III E N T . 

The sagacious reader has, of course, already guessed 
that ihe hundred and twenty pounds with which Mr. Mer- 
rydew entered so hopefully upon his London career showed 
a constant, vicious tendency in the reverend gentleman’s 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


167 


pocket to reduce itself, and that rapidly, to small change. 
In steady succession the little sheets of rustling paper came 
from their folds and changed into gold; the 3^ellow, royal 
gold was metamorphosed piece by piece into common- place, 
well-fingered coins of silver; and the silver was reduced to 
worthless, sordid copper, worn and stained, and scratched 
and bitten by costermongers and children and beggars, and 
all the other anxious slaves of Dura Faupertiis. Life for 
Merrydew lost all buoyancy and freedom — seemed scarcely 
worth the living— when he considered that the day was fast 
approaching when he would have again to pause before 
spending a shilling. He proposed to himself at one time 
to arrest its approach by taking his “ balance to a bank, 
and def3ring anxiety to touch his heart through the thick 
armour of a cheque book; he thought of this, but the 
thought had to vanish before the reflection that no good 
bank would let him open aii account with so small a turn 
as he then possessed, and even if it would, of what real ad- 
vantage would it be, so long as he was not earning and 
must continue to spend? At another time he resolved to 
look away all but the change of one five-pound note. But 
he had barely turned the key upon his “ balance when 
he had to liberate it again, that it might return, he was 
confident, with a considerable increment. That came 
about in this wise. 

In the course of a few weeks Merrydew had become very 
intimate with Signor Bottiglia. He was interested by the 
wide and curious information of the Italian, and struck 
with admiration of his daring speculation in business, and 
his cheerful, ready resource in difficulty, while he was flat- 
tered by the deference he paid him as a scholar, a clergy- 
man, and a gentleman. Merrydew visited his “ emporium 
of antiquities and curiosities^’ in Margaret Street so often 
that he knew the price set upon all the “ articles of vertu.” 

“ You take the business up so clever, sir,” said Bottiglia, 
one day, “ that you might, what you say, keep ze shop, if 
I wanted to take a voyage. O’ course, I not mean you 
wish to; this is not ze business at all for you, sir — for a 
scholar of ze Latin and the Grecque, though, o’ course, it is 
vjry well for me, the old i<oldat — si, soldat very little — sold 
jigain,” he said, laughing wistfully; for he evidently was 
^il,lly conscious that his halting knowdedge of English had 
made him miss the proper effect of the droll thing the 


168 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


English call a pun. “ Yes, si; you know everyth'ng, I 
thiik. Ah, no; there is one — my beauty, my treasure! you 
have not seen; it is not for all to see; it is not for all to 
know that I have it. Come with me. Tessa, mind ze 
shop.^^ 

They went into the back parlour, into the admirable 
disorder of which Merrydew had oftener than once already 
penetrated. A discoloured marble bust of a Eoman Em- 
peror, dug out of a house in Pompeii, was in a corner, 
familiarly nosing an altar-piece from a church in Lom- 
bardy. A bronze Faun stood with his back turned upon a 
broken-armed marble Venus in the window-seat. At the 
end of the mantel-shelf the god Pan (in bronze) sat and 
pla^^ed to a tortured saint of Masaccio hanging over against 
him. Here, there, everywhere were “ curios in ivory 
and in china, rare engravings, stones wonderfully set, 
antique chairs and stools, bits of beautiful lace, and lengths 
of rare tapestry — and old iron and old bronze, rubbish of 
all sorts, out of which the shrewd Italian turned many a 
necessary daily penny. From the cupboard next the fire- 
place Bottiglia took a black case, about a foot and a half 
square. He unlocked and unhooked the hinged lid, and 
then stood back to observe the effect on Merrydew of the 
first glimpse at the revealed treasure. 

“ Ah!^^ exclaimed the parson. 

“Ah, ah!^’ cried the Italian. “There you are! That 
is ‘ cinque-cento ' — it is of the fifteenth centenary! It is 
the work of the devil Benvenuto Cellini!^'’ 

“ Bless me!^^ cried Merrydew. “ May I take it out to 
look?” 

It was a round iron shield, with a Gorgon-head for boss, 
and a spirited design, encircling the boss, of the “ Massacre 
of the Innocents,” all in fine repousse work. There were 
golden streaks aud stains on it here and there, showing it 
had once been gilt. 

“Look — see — at the beautiful attitudes! — the beautiful 
legs and arms! Ah! Si grand! Si magnifique! Si — si 
pretty!” cried the Italian, stuttering in his enthusiasm. 

“ And that is the work of Cellini, eh?” said Menydew. 

“ 1 will swear it is,” said the other; “ done with his own 
cold chisel and hammer — years and 3 -ears of work. But, 
unfortunately, sir, I have not, what you say, the pedigree. 
I buy it now some years from a castle in Lombardy, aud I 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


169 


was promised the paper showing it was from Benvenuto; 
but, no, no, I have not receive it. If I had the paper I 
would say, ‘ Thrty thousand pound you pay, and it is for 
you.-’ I have not the paper, and I say, ‘ Very well; ten 
thousand.'’ 

“ Thirty thousand I’^ exclaimed Merrydew, gazing at it 
in amazement. 

“ What you t’ink? I take and show it to the King of 
Belgium — I show it to the Baron Schv/arthschild — I show 
it to your Sir Eichard Bruce. They say, ‘ Where is the 
certificate?’ I say, ‘ 1 have not.’ So they say, ‘ Ah, well. 
It is grand; it is pretty, but money is very scarce. I will give 
you five — six thousand.’ Isay, ‘Good morning. Merci, 
non. It is the beautiful prize of my life. I sold all I had 
to buy it. I know it is Cellini, and I sell it for Cellini, at 
Cellini price, or I put it in my coffin with me when I die!’ ” 

“ Why don’t you take it to South Kensington?” said 
Merrydew. 

“South Kensington!” exclaimed Bottiglia. “ 

That for South Kensington ! South Kensington is t’ief! I 
take it and show it, and they say, ‘ We give you two thou- 
sand!’ ‘ Merci, gentlemen,’ I sa 3 \ ‘ I make you jjresent 
of it when I am tired. 1 send it by Parcel Delivery!’ ” 

And the intrepid dealer laughed scornfully. 

Merr^^dew turned the shield round and round, and ad- 
mired the work, the rare beauty and value of which he 
felt but vaguely (for his art education had been rather neg- 
lected), but the “ upset ” price of which he considered 
with respect and envy. 

“ I wish,” said the parson, “ it were mine.” 

“ Will you buy it?” said Bottiglia. 

“ Me buy it! My dear friend, if you cut it up in pieces 
I have not money enough to buy one of the figures — not 
even one of the babies!” 

From this they fell into an interchange of confidence (or 
wdiat seemed to each confidence) concerning their financial 
condition. Merrydew made it tolerably clear that he 
would, in the anxious situation into which he had got, wel- 
come any means of making his few leaves of bank-notes 
turn to blossom and fruit. Bottiglia, with instaiit gen- 
erosity, offered him a chance. He was thinking of buying 
a fine old mantel-piece from a fine old house in Highgate; 
would Mr. Merrydew care to invest fifty or sixty pounds in 


170 


A KEVE11EJS'I> GENTLEMAN". 


that? He knew where he could get one hundred pounds for 
it, and he would charge Mr. Merrydew only the very small- 
est percentage of a commission for effecting a sale. Mith 
this offer Merrydew closed at once; the substantial value of 
the Cellini shield so imposed upon his imagination, that if 
at that moment Bottiglia had proposed he should join him 
in a speculative exchange of new lamps for old he would 
have agreed with alacrity. 

Thus it came to pass that Merrydew took out the ‘ bal- 
ance which he had locked away, and bought a marble 
mantel-piece “of antique design, finely carved,"'’ as Bot- 
tiglia afterwards described it in his catalogue. But, .das! 
it was one thing to buy a marble mantel-piece “ cf antique 
design,"" and another thing altogether to sell it. The per- 
son from whom Bottiglia had hoped to get one hundred 
pounds for it, did not long for a marble mantel-piece of 
any design, but he was willing to negotiate for the purchase 
of a wooden mantel-piece whieh was really old and quaint. 

“Never mind,’" said Bottiglia, cheerfully. “What a 
devil! We will sell him soon tor more than a hundred — 
to-morrow, perhaps, or the next day."" 

Not a day passed but Merrydew found excuse for walk- 
ing round by Margaret Street, and looking in at the em- 
porium of antiques. If Bottiglia were in, he would find 
occasion before he left him to ask if a customer had yet 
been found for “ that thing;"" if Bottiglia were not in, he 
>Ayould slip through the shop to the little shed without to 
assure himself. 

VQth the greater part of his available cash thus solidified 
into marble, Merr3Tlew"s whole outlook became clouded and 
his mind perturbed. He could not take counsel with his 
daughter, for she did not know their money was so far 
spent. He laid his anxiety before his friend Bottiglia. 
Bottiglia was shocked that he had been the cause of such a 
serious marmorisation of necessary cash. 

“ Ah, now!"" cried he. “ What a devil! If I had only 
know! I would pay you your money you invest iii the 
antique, but I have not. And if I pay, it will only spend. 
Va, now; see. You pay too. much for your lodging. 1 
know where you can, what you say, rent a very nice draw- 
ing-room and one, two bedroom for a pound— in the same 
house with me. I live not here, you know, o’ course; 1 
live with my niece, my Tessa, in a lodging in Percy Circus, 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


171 


Peatonville. It is not wliat you say swell, but it is very 
jolly — very nice; and what a devil does it matter where 
you have lodging in London? Me, I like Pentonville; it 
is fresh air; it rise up out of the hole. Come to-night and 
see, and bring your daughter. There will be a risotto for 
supper — Tessa is home to make it — and a jolly flask of 
Chianti. 

Merrydew straightway carried the invitation to his daugh- 
ter. She, poor girl, had been growing more and more de- 
spondent of her own and her father^s prospects. She had 
once or twice appealed to him to let her go away again as 
a governess, since she had failed to get aJiy daily engage- 
ments, but her father would not hear of it. Again and 
again she had thought she would write to young Mr. Cholm- 
ley, to remind him of his promise to help her, but she 
shrank from doing it; he had probably forgotten all about 
his promise, or, surely, he would have written to her. She 
was the more piqued at his silence, because he had seemed 
more than usually interested in her. She, therefore, wel- 
comed this novel opportunity for cheerful distraction, at 
the same time as she approved of her father’s intention to 
seek cheaper lodgings. 

“ We should never have taken these rooms, father — but 
there, daddy, I shall say no more about it.” 

“ Better not, my dear; we need not recriminate. We 
are both very unfortnnate. lean understand why 1 should 
be; I suppose i’mgettiiig an old fellow; but you — I cannot 
understand how it is you have got no situation yet, my 
dear.” 

It is very strange, father,” said Kate; but she did not 
say she was begiiining to suspect that one strong reason was 
that she was her father’s daughter; again and again she 
had been asked, when she made known her name, whether 
she was the daughter of the clergyman who had behaved so 
oddly somewhere in Wales, and she had observed when she 
confessed as much, that a veil of caution or of suspicion 
had then dropped between her and her would-be employer. 

“ Very strange, indeed, my dear — and awkward too; but 
perhaps our luck will turn with a change of lodging. I 
picked up a bit of coal in the street this afternoon; that 
means fortune. ” 

When Merrydew and his daughter arrived in Percy Cir- 
cus they were espied from the window^ and had the door 


172 A KEVEKEKD GENTLEMAN. 

opened to, them by Bottiglia himself, shining with good 
nature and anticipation of high jinks. He received the 
young lady with a florid courtesy touched witli a respect- 
ful familiarity; for he had seen her once or twice already 
at his shop, and her father was his friend. 

“ Excuse me,"’ he said, with a masterly bow, “ for just 
a moment; I must tell Mrs. Bolder, my landlady, that you 
have come.” 

Bottiglia rented “ the parlours,” and in the front par- 
lour the feast was being spread. Merrydew and Kate 
glanced at the table and at each other; the table was laid 
for a company; there were other guests then — who were 
they ? 

They were soon satisfied on this head, when the lafidlady, 
a little, sprightly, withered old woman of seventy, or there- 
abouts (she declared afterwards she was eighty-three), the 
landlady’s widow daughter (who was acting housekeeper) 
and her family — a well-wdiiskered young man of three- or 
four-and-twent}^, a young woman of twenty or so, and a 
girl of twelve — all entered in embarrassed procession, and 
were introduced to the distinguished guests of the evening. 
After them came a shy, pale young man, whom Bottiglia 
introduced as Mr. Pentecost — “ a clever man, an author.” 
It was a reunion of all who lived in the house, of which 
Bottiglia was the bosom friend, and good genius — all ex- 
cept “ the second-floor front,” who was a bachelor, a 
hermit, and a miser with his money in a bandbox. 

In a few minutes Merrydew learned from the little old 
landlady that “ though he was a foreigner,” Bottiglia 
(whom she insisted on calling “Mr. Botilly ”) had the 
best heart of any man she had ever known — “and I’ve 
known a good many in my time, sir, I can tell you ” — and 
he had been her friend for a dozen years. Kate, too, 
quickly found herself on a friendly footing with the grand- 
daughter of twenty, who was a teacher at a neighbouring 
school. 

Nor was it long before Merrydew found that even here 
his Shandy escapade was known. It was not openly talked 
of; but the sprightly old lady (who was not a strait-laced 
old lady at all) declared very pointedly, and with a certain 
twinkle of her old eye, that she very seldom went to 
church, but that if she knew he was going to preach at any 
time, she and “ Mr. Botilly ” would be sure to go and hear 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


1^3 


liini. The pale literary young man, too, asked him whether 
he did not think Sterne a master of style, and especially 
of the delightful art of dialogue. 

In the meantime they had sat down to table. In its early 
stage the supper threatened to be as dull and formal as a 
feast partaken of by stupid ladies and gentlemen of the West 
End, but as the Italian Chianti flowed and mingled reck- 
lessly with the generous British porter (in a can from round 
the corner), which the octogenarian landlady protested she 
preferred, manners were mollified and spirits exhilarated. 
Merrydew (whom the lively old lady persisted in calling 
“ Mr. Merryjew,'^ in spite of his protestation that, if he 
was merry at all, he was a merry Gentile) was very friendly 
and appreciative. He put off all the clerical dignity with 
which he was supposed to be invested, and drank a glass of 
Chianti with the lively old lady. He praised everything 
— and made Bottiglia’s niece, the artless Tessa, blush — he 
praised the maccaroni, and the slices of huge Bologna 
sausage, but most of all he praised the ruotto. (If any of 
my readers has never been introduced to a ruotto let him 
try to make its acquaintance.) 

“ I declare, Bottiglia,^’ said he, “ this is, I think, the 
finest dish I ever tasted. If I had any sort of talent for 
rhyming I would write a Ballade of the Risotto, like that 
thing of Thackeray’s, you know, Mr. Pentecost, about 
‘ Bouillabaisse — ’ ” 

“ Va! A1 diavolo — Bouillabaisse!” cried the excited 
Bottiglia. 

— “Or like those things,’^ continued Merrydew, “of 
What’b-his-name— the rascal French poet of long ago that 
everybody talks of now.” 

“ You mean Villon, I suppose, sir,” said the young 
author. 

“ That’s the man,” said Merrydew. 

“ What a devil should we go to a villain French poet?” 
cried Bottiglia. “ AVe have here a poet. Mister Pentecost 
is poet” — a declaration which made the pale young man 
blush. “ He will make a Ballade of Risotto. You make 
me, Mister Pentecost, a Ballade of Risotto, and J will pay 
you. But how is them things sold? If it was an old key, 
or an old candlestick, or an imitation old, I know what to 
say— but for a ballade I know not.” 

After supper, while the table was being cleared, Ku e 


174 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


iiiid Merrydew were conducted by the old landlady and 
Bottiglia to see (he rooms to let. The drawing-room was 
rather scantily furnished, but, as Kate observed, it had 
only the more room for their own pieces of furniture. 
The rent proposed, too, was small, and it was made less 
under the influence of Bottiglia’s friendship, and of Merry- 
dew’s own good-natured behaviour during the evening; so 
the parson and his daughter agreed to enter on possession 
at the end of a week. 

Then they returned down-staii’s. In the parlour was a 
piano (is there ever a respectable parlour without a speci- 
men of that much-abused instrument?); so, while the 
youngsters cried out for a dance, the oldsters pled for a 
quiet entertainment for the rest of the evening. Bottiglia 
volunteered to give his pretty little Florentine song, “ Tic 
e tic e toe! che bel moretto!” which all (excejit, of coui’se, 
the Merrydews) knew, and in the “ Tra-la-la ” of which 
they all joined with extreme enjoyment. Then Kate dis- 
tinguished herself in a manner which was of great conse- 
quence to her hereafter. She sang and played with good 
feeling and knowledge of effect the simple Scotch pathetic 
ballad of “ Mary Hamilton.” When she sang the refrain: 

“ Yesternight there were four Maries; 

This night there will be but three: 

There was ]\Iary Beaton, and Mary Seaton, 

And Mary Carmichael, and me,” 

Bottiglia fairly melted, and let the tears run down his hon- 
est, swarthy nose. He knew a fine voice when he heard it 
— what Italian does not? — and he was something of a 
musical virtuoso. From that night he was Kate’s devoted 
friend. 

On their way back to Woburn Place, Merrydew confessed 
to his daughter he had got a great deal of enjoyment out 
of his evening spent with humble friends; indeed, he was 
not sure but that for the regular wear and tear of life hum- 
ble friends were not the best of all. He believed — he felt 
— that in going to live with them he and his daughter 
would be making “a change for the better,” instead of 
taking a big step down the social ladder, as some might 
fancy. He expatiated on the comparative salubrity of the 
situation of Pentonville. It was not so fashionable as Ken- 
sington, but it was almost as fresh, for it occupied the only 
high ground between Kensington and the city; and it was 


A IIEYER^NI:) GEKT LEMAN". 


175 


much more convenient than Kensington for the theatres, 
the shops, the streets, and all the daylight and gaslight dis- 
tractions and dissipations of town. Then that view from 
the top of Great Percy Street which they had before they 
went into the house! It was almost as extensive as that 
from Highgate Hill. 

So, in the fulness of time (that is, when their “ notice 
at ^V'obiirn Place had expired), the parson and his daugh- 
ter migrated to Pentonville— to that part of it near to what 
was known a generation ago as Bagnigge Wells (called, in 
the vulgar tongue, “ Baanulge fragrant with memories 
of Mistress G Wynne, and redolent of the presence of hum- 
ble followers of the immortal Nell, and of noisy young 
^sculaps who walk the hospital wards of Bartholomew or 
of Guy by day, and the billiard-rooms of The Red Cow or 
The Green Man by night. 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

CONJUGAL TRIALS. 

In the meantime, EthePs married life at Sherborne Hall 
was becoming a burden of suspicion and anxiety. It is a 
sad and painful episode of our history, so painful that it 
must be related and disposed of as briefly as possible. 

Her first wild fit of jealous pain (which came through 
her discovery of the loving pair through the spy-glass) she 
quieted with argument and fear. If, she told herself,-on 
such fantastic showing, she were to suspect so readily her 
husband of being interested in another woman, what a life 
of torment would she enter upon! And, after all, the 
man she saw through the glass might not have been her 
husband. It was, certainly, not very likely that in that 
solitary neighbourhood there was another man dressed like 
her husband; but still there might be. Oh, there must 
be! Jack had made lier believe he loved her so, and she 
had so unreservedly loved Jack! they had been married so 
short a time! it was impossible that he should be turning 
away from her, turning away already! No! She could 
not — she would not believe it! 

But she was not able long thus to protest against, and to 
repel, her own suspicion, since it was encouraged and aided 
by her daily experience. She began to perceive in Jack a 


176 


A REVEKEND GEKTLEMAIT. 


subdued enthusiasm, which she saw had no reference to 
herself. He was more and more from home, for the whole 
day frequently; again and again she scanned the borders 
of the moor from the roof whence she had seen the pair of 
lovers (though never again did she dare to use the spy- 
glass), but she saw no human figure at all. Yet she heard 
now and then that her husband had driven to the station, 
or had been seen at the station. (Such scraps of news, she 
iiDticeil, the servants, who were very fond of her, gave in 
a side-long fashion and with a certain acridity of point). 
She observed, too, that Miss Cardigan was not at church 
on several successive Sundays. Where was she? And 
when her husband was at home he preferred to sit by him- 
self. If she went to caress him he would petulantly put 
her away with “ DonH.^^ Then she would think that per- 
haps he was not well, and would say, “ You are no^ your- 
self, dear. What can I do for you?’^ To which he would 
reply, “ 1 am all right. I only want to be let alone;^'’ and 
then he would leave her, and the only sign of compunction 
he would show for the pain he must have known he often 
thus gave was a greater impatience and irritability when 
under her gentle eye. 

Soon to this trouble on her own account was added an 
anxiety about her father atjd Kate. She corresponded 
with her sister once a week, and she found Kate^s letters 
grow more and more foreboding — what with her confessed 
inability to find another situation and her vague hints re- 
garding expenditure. Then came the news of the removal 
to other, cheaper lodgings, and she knew that things could 
not be going very well, and that he father must be hard 
pushed indeed to retreat thus from his first position. She 
longed — with a longing all the stronger that she was her- 
self so neglected now— to be near her father and sister to 
cheer and help them. She could not but speak to Jack 
about it. If, she thought, she could only get him away 
from that place, away to London, she might have him ail 
to herself again. 

She was in her room one evening, preparing for bed. 
Jack was vyith her, in amiable mood; he had still at inter- 
vals accessions of fondness, which were all the more urgent 
now that his wife was become somewhat shier and colder. 
He was very loving that night, and she brightened her 
spirits up, and forgot for the time her ugly suspicion. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. It 7 

“ Oh, Jack dear/^ she exclaimed, “ if we were only liv^- 
ing by ourselves in a little cosy house. 

“What!^^ said he, “you're not comfortable here, 
then?" 

“ Oh, yes. Jack; it's not that. Everybody is very kind 
and there is every comfort here; but don't you understand, 
dear, how much I wish we could lead our own life, and 
have all its little pleasures shut up in a little house of our 
own? Here our life is just as if it were a part of other peo- 
ple's lives, in the same way as we have a share in other peo- 
ple's rooms. " 

“ Other people," said Jack, looking at her rather sharp- 
ly, “ meaning father, I suppose." 

“ Oh, Jack, you know 1 like your father very much. 1 
don't mean him altogether. 1 think 1 could live with him 
always without feeling any trouble. But there are others 
— I mean, dear, there's a houseful of servants, and in a 
great place like this you can't feel at home, because there 
have been people here before who must begrudge your be- 
ing here, and people yet to come who want to push you 
out." 

“ 1 see," said Jack, looking at her thoughtfully. 
“ You'd have never done for a duchess or a countess, 
Ethel; you were not born to be a great lady, evidently." 

“No, Jack; I'm sure I was not. And sometimes 1 
think it was very wrong and foolish ever to let you make 
me your lady, though you are not an earl or a duke." 

“ Nor ever likely to be, my dear. But you mustn't talk 
like that; it is doleful and uncomfortable. What! crying, 
Ethel?" for she had sat down in a violent fit of sobbing. 
“ Why, what's the matter?" and he went to caress and 
comfort her. 

“I don't know, dear," said she, now ready to laugh. 
“ But 1 have been rather upset. You know I had a letter 
from Kate this afternoon; they are not getting on well in 
London." 

“ Humph!" said Jack, glooming a little. “ I never ex- 
pected they would." 

“ Oh, Jack dear, I should so like to be near them, to 
see them sometimes, and to help them a little. Don't be 
cross with me, dear," she pled, for he was glooming more 
and more. “ But why can't we go to London, and start a 
proper life of our own? Are we always to go on wasting 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


m 

our time, as we have been doing here. Jack, day after day? 
Are you never going to begin to work at some profession 
or business, Jack?^^ 

“ Oh, this is too niuchl'^ cried Jack, jumping up and 
pacing the room. “ I am not going to London, and I 
don't want to see your family any more. 1 have made you 
my wife, but I never bargained to look after them or keep 
them; there was no understanding to that effect. And 
whether I go into a profession or no, that^s my affair, 
though, you know well enough, I would have gone into a 
profession, but my father would not let me.’^ 

8he looked at him piteously a moment, and then fell 
a-sobbiug again, while Jack continued to pace the room in 
greater irritation than ever. 

“ Oh, my dear,'^ she cried, “ you will break my heart!’-’ 

“ Break your heart!’’ he exclaimed. “ What preposter- 
ous stuff!” 

“ I don’t think you know anything about it. Jack,” said 
she, trying to overcome her emotion. “ You cannot love 
me as I love you, or you would not speak to me like that. 
I may not be lit to be a great lady — I may not even be the 
wife you should have had — but I am your wife. Jack, and 
I want to help you as a wife should help her husband. Oh, 
my dear, don’t stand looking so dark and angry with me! 
1 can’t bear it.” 

And with that she threw herself into the corner of the 
couch, while Jack continued in moody silence, pacing up 
and down. In a few minutes he came and sat by her — the 
sight of her soft, sweet beauty, and the echo of her piteous 
words no doubt softened and moved him. He caressed and 
soothed her, called her his “ sweet, little wife,” asked her 
to forgive him, and, of course, received forgiveness from 
the loving little soul; and so for the time they were recon- 
ciled. 

For some days after this scene Jack was more at home 
and more with her, and Ethel’s little sky began to clear up 
and her little world to look brighter. But on Sunday she 
saw that Miss Cardigan had returned from wheiever she 
had been; and from that day darkness and doubt again de- 
scended upon her, and fear and pain seized her heart. Jack 
again became restless, gloomy, and irritable; again he took 
to absenting himself from home. 

Thus for our poor Ethel one weary day followed another. 


A REVEllEND GENTLEMAN. 


179 


All the country round had burst forth into fresh, delight- 
ful green, birds were chirping and bopping vigorously, and 
singing joyously, and the eager sun was hurrying in the 
summer over the head of the belated spring, but they 
brought no joy and little hope to the girhs heart. Little 
hope, I say — but a little hope there was which, growing in 
these latter days to a sure expectation, changed her from 
an uncertain, humble young woman to a resolute young 
wife — a prospective mother. Before this she had bowed 
herself, though with pain, to the possibility of another 
woman taking her place in her husband's heart; she had 
doubted, indeed, whether she were not really the usurper 
of the other woman's place; but now doubt vanished; 
Nature herself taught her that now, if not before, she had 
an indefeasible right to her husband's whole allegiance. 

AVhen she found her husband was neither so elated nor 
engrossed as herself with the hope of what the months 
would bring, she was indignant. For a little while, how- 
ever, he yielded the constant attendance she exacted of him 
— it was novel and amusing to him — and then he flung olf 
again, and left her to herself and her jealous brooding. 
There began about this time to be some excuse for his fre- 
quent absences; he had joined the yeomanry of the district 
— a concession to his military longings which his father 
permitted with many grunts and prophecies of evil. 

“ Soldiering never brings anything but waste and wicked- 
ness. Don't tell me; I've seen too much o't," he said. 
“ Your yeomanry's not regular soldiering. I know that. 
Only playing at soldiers; so much the worse. But you'll 
liave your way— and that way's to the devil. You must 
excuse my talking like that before you, my dear," said he, 
nodding and smiling at Ethel. “ Perhaps you think it's 
hard of me. But you don't know my son so well as I do." 

A declaration which made his son blush and angrily 
glower, and which served to enlarge the general doubt and 
disillusionment with which the son’s wife regarded her hus- 
band. 

All this gathering of doubt and suspicion was speedily 
brought to a head. One of these early summer days she 
received a letter from her father, which in itself was an 
event, but which in its contents was fruitful of terrible 
consequence. This is a copy of it: 


180 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


“ ] 0 Percy Circus, London, W. G. 

“ My DEAR Child, — I have been leaving our corre- 
spondence to Kate, who up till a week ago had little other 
occupation for her talents. Now, through the inlluence 
of a very good foreign friend who lives in this house, she 
has two or three engagements to teach music and ‘ ze En- 
glish as she is spoke.' 1 myself have been a good deal 
occupied and very much worried about earning our daily 
bread. I can not claim to have been very successful, 
though I have the satisfaction of knowing that I have be- 
tween fifty and sixty pounds very securely invested. But 
the kind of thing I can do in the way of writing does not 
seem in these days to be much in demand. In journalism, 
style and wit have been voted dull, and are fast becoming ob- 
solete — except in one distinguished evening paper, the ‘ Pall 
Mall Gazette,'* to which I have found the entree. The first 
of a set of four papers which I have been concocting, I sent 
in, without any introduction, to Mr. Freshwood, the editor. 
He has a fine palate for a literary flavor, and he accepted 
my contribution at once. That was a fortnight ago, and 1 
am now at the fourth of my articles. They are called 
‘ Notes of "Wild Wales' (you see the pun) — ‘ by a Welsh 
Parson.' I shall send the set to you when finished. Well, 
with this, that, and the other I have been visiting the 
Eeading-room of the British Museum more of late. Who 
do you think I should meet on the look-out for me there 
the other morning? George Cardigan (of course you re- 
member him). He has been in town almost as long as we 
have. He has not known our address; but wishing pa:* 
ticularly to see me, and remembering that I had said when 
he saw me at your father-in-law's, that I would go to the 
British Museum pretty often when in London, he came to 
look for me there. 

“ His business with me was of a very surprising and 
awkward kind. It concerns you, and yet, my dear, I don't 
know how to tell you of it. If what Cardigan told me 
shoidd be a slander, it would be cruel to tell you; if it 
should be true, it. will none the less pain you. My dear 
child, are you happy, quite happy with your husband? I 
do not mean ‘ are you always smiling upon and fondling 
each other?' For in the nature of things that can not be. 

* It should be remembered that this letter was written in 1877. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


181 


But have you coiifidenoe in him, and in his love for you 
when he is not with you? Really, I don^t know how best 
to break the matter to you. 

“ This is what Cardigan told me: He has received an 
anonymous letter from someone near you — from a servant, 
evidently, or a person of that sort, for the letter (I have 
seen it) is badly written and spelt — which declares that 
you go about Sherborne Hall very unhappy and neglected, 
and that your husband is taken up with someone else, 
whom he knew before he married you. You may think 
that even if this is true it is but a cruel kindness, indeed, 
to tell you of it. But at the same time, my dear, you and 
your husband ought to know that there are people about 
you who take note of your behaviour, and draw their own 
conclusions from it. Cardigan thinks, from the fact of 
the letter having been sent to him, that the person alluded 
to as engaging your husband’s attention must be his sister, 
but I have told him that 1 do not see it is necessarily so. 

“ I hope to hear from you that this anonymous tale is a 
slander. 1 have said nothing to Kate about it, so when 
you write to me you had better address at Carlo Bottiglia’s, 
Margaret Street, Regent Street, W. 

“ Your loving father, 

“Wm. Merrydew. 

“ p.S. — The ‘ P. M. G.’ sends out cheques only once a 
month, so that 1 have as yet received no money from my 
‘ Notes ’ (no change, I might say), and our finances have 
sunk to a very low ebb. 

“ W. M.” 

It will be seen that Merrydew’s letter somewhat resem- 
bled the traditional young lady’s, its weight hung in the 
postscript. This Ethel tore off and folded into the little 
purse in which lay her modest store of pin-money. 

Then she stood with the mutilated letter in her hand un- 
conscious of what was about her. Before her agitated vis- 
ion there lay the scene she had looked at weeks ago through 
the spy-glass; she saw her husband and a woman walk 
arm-in-arm, and inclined to each other as lovers walk. 
The jealous suspicion which had hung vaguely about her, 
and which she had tried to get rid of was now become clear 
and public. Other eyes than hers had seen and had sus- 
pected also, and she was ashamed and indignant— indignant 


182 


A EEVEREND GENTLEMAN". 


not with her husband only, but with those who had pried 
upon him, and who had gossiped probably with each other 
about his relations with his wife, pitying her, calling her 
“ poor thing!^’ She would not be pitied! She must then, 
it seemed, wear different looks from those she had been in 
the habit of showing. Oh, what should she do? How 
must she behave? 

With swelling heart, pulled this way and that by love, 
shame, anger, and jealousy, she could not make up her 
mind what to do. At length she heard a step on the land- 
ing (she had taken her letter off to lier room to read); she 
knew it was her husband^s; he was returning from his 
yeomanry drill. She would show him the letter, and hear 
what he had to say; she could no longer endure the tort- 
ures of suspicion. 

When he entered in all his gorgeous panoply, booted and 
spurred, and with his sabre clanking at his heels, a desper- 
ate pang shot through her heart. This was her husband, 
and yet he was not hers. He was about to pass on into his 
dressing-room without regarding her. 

“ Jack!'^ she called. 

“ Hallo,^^ said he, turning and observing her; “ I 
didn’t know you were here.” 

He looked preoccupied, but whether with the details of 
cavalry drill or with something else it was impossible to 
say. 

“ I want you. Jack, please, to read this letter I’ve got 
from father.” 

“ From your father, eh?” said he, carelessly taking the 
letter; ‘‘he doesn’t write often, does he?” 

He read a little with a loose attention, saying, “ ‘ Pall 
Mall,’ eh? Ah, well, that’s all right; it will bring him a 
five-pound note, I suppose, and I dare say he needs it; he 
usually does.” And then he handed the letter back to 
her. 

“ Read on, please. Jack,” said she, “ to the end.” 

He again took the letter, with something of a thoughtful 
frown, and resumed the reading of it. It was manifest 
when he came to the name of Cardigan his attention be- 
came fixed. From that point he read and read again, and 
then he handed it to his wife. There was a pause of a 
second or two. 

“ Well?” said she, in a low, constrained voice. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


183 


“ Well,” he echoed, “ 1 Ihink it’s very foolish of your 
father to have written such a thing to you. If he had a 
complaint to make of that kind he should have written to 
me.” 

“ But,” said she, “ he does not make a complaint. He 
only tells what was in the letter Mr. Cardigan got.” 

“ Letter he got! 1 believe it to be his own invention.” 

“ But,” said she, “ father sa 3 ^s he saw the letter.” 

“ That does not prove George Cardigan did not write 
it.” 

“ But why. Jack — why — why should he write it?” 

“ Why? because we had a quarrel, and he hates me and 
would like to make trouble.” 

“I would not have thought,” said she, “he was that 
sort of man.” 

“ You disliked him enough at one time,” said Jack. 

Again there was a pause, in which Jack began to move 
away. 

“ But, Jack dear,” said she, almost losing control of 
herself with the difficulty of carrying this through; “ have 
you nothing to say to me about it? What the letter saj^s 
— is it true?” 

“ The letter,” said he, with a forced little laugh, “ seems 
to say you mope about as if you were neglected. 1 should 
have thought you were the proper person to tell if that be 
true.” 

“ Oh, don’t shuffle. Jack!” she said, and then was as- 
tonished that she had used so strong a word. 

“ Shuffle!” he exclaimed, and his eyes seemed to con- 
tract into an intense, destroying glitter. “ Your father 
forwards to you a charge — an anonymous charge, he says 
— that you are neglected and ill-used hero, and you ask me, 
‘ Is that true?’ ” 

“ Oh, no. Jack — no — you know 1 did not ask that! Is 
it true that you are tired of me already? that there is an- 
other whom you knew before, that you care for again?” 

“ My dear,” he answered, quite promptly, “how can 
(here be? Miss Cardigan, I suppose, you are thinking of, 
because I had a little flirtation with her at one time. You 
surely have not been so silly as to think — ” 

“ Silly!” she interrupted; she felt he was still trying to 
evade her question; she could no longer control herself; 
the Jealousy and pain which had been gathering for weeks 


184 


A REVEKEND GK^'TLEMAX. 


rushed for utterance. “ Oh, how wicked and deceitful 3 ^ou 
are to me. Jack! You want to pretend 1 have nothing to 
trouble me! You don’t know what I have been suffering! 
You say it is only my silly fancy — when I have seen with 
my own eyes what, it seems, others have seen, too— seen 
you with her out there! Oh, my dear!” 

Mr. Jack Parkin was taken aback; clandestinism is 
always surprised to find it has not been absolute secresy. 
He had no word ready to utter, lie had no conception of 
how much or how little his wife knew, till she said “ out 
there,” when, glancing through the window, he saw the 
copse below and then the rising stretch of moorland. 

“ If,” said he, “ you have seen me when 1 was out for a 
ride come across Miss Oardigaii now and again, you have 
been watching my movements very attentively, but you 
have not seen much to trouble a sensible person.” 

“ For weeks,” said she, with feebler utterance, “you 
have scarcely been at home at all. Where were you? 
What were you doing all the time?” 

“ You know very well,” he replied, “ that our drill 
takes me out a good deal. ” 

“ Before that, long before, you would be out the whole 
day, not riding, nor shooting, nor anything — gone even on 
rai I way journeys. ’ ’ 

That last phrase discomposed Jack a good deal. 

“ By G — d!” he cried, “ I’m not going to be catechised 
about my movements in that fashion. I don’t see your 
right, or anybody’s right. I didn’t marry you to be pinned 
to your tail, or to go out only where and when you might 
kindly permit me to go. I am my own master, and will 
go where I like, and speak to whom I like — and if you 
don’t like it— if you choose to take ridiculous notions into 
your head and go mad over them, that’s your affair!” 

And he strode away into his dressiug-room, and slammed 
the door. 

Her first thought was that she and her husband were 
now forever alienated, and that to her loving heart seemed 
worse than death. Bhe had been silly, she had been mad. 
If she wearied her husband, as perhaps she had done, it 
was very natural that he should go and talk to some other 
he knew, whom he remembered as being bright and hand- 
some. She had brooded till she had imagined wrongs and 
deceits, 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


185 


Thus, with excuse for her husband, and abasement of 
self which a. generous loving woman always makes to the 
lord of her life — and will continue to make, I daresay, till 
the end of time, in spite of the supremest attainment of 
Woman’s hights — she speedily found that she was entirely 
in the wrong, at least that she must be forgiven and taken 
back to her husband’s arms. 

She crept to the dressing-room door, and timidly knocked. 
Her husband did not seem to hear. She ventured to knock 
louder, and to call in an uncertain voice, “Jack!” He 
came and opened the door, and saw at once how matters 
were. The man would have been a rufiian who could not 
have at once dismissed all displeasure or indignation and 
drawn into his embrace that sweet, beseeching woman, who 
stood by the door with meek head and downcast eyes, and 
her lingers nervously clasped before her, in mute appeal 
for forgiveness and reconciliation. Jack Parkin was not a 
good young man at all, but he was not a ruffian, and he 
had generosity enough to feel that Ethel’s attitude towards 
him ought rather to be his towards her. He took her to 
his arms, and as he held her there sobbing I venture to 
think he felt humbled and ashamed. I even think he was 
for a time as much in love with his wife as he had ever 
been. 

“Jack dear,” she ventured to say, a little later, when 
they sat content with each other, “ you know 1 love you 
with all my heart and soul, and you must love me, please. 
Jack, and only me, or I shall die. And then you know. 
Jack, though 1 am not the girl you should have married, I 
am your wife; and if you did not want me to think of you 
always, to try to help you always, and always to have you 
for niy own dear husband, you should not have married 
me — should you?” 

“ Certainly, my dear,” said he, “ there is something in 
that.” 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

A WEDDING FEAST. 

Some of my readers have, I daresay, been asking 
whether Jack’s father did not do something to divert the 
thoughts of his daughter-in-law, and to lighten the tedium 
of her existence in his house. Well, in the first place, he 


186 


A IIEVEKEIS’D GENTLEMAN. 


passed a tolerably tedious life himself at Sherborne, and 
yet — what with his pipe and his orchids, and his pipe and 
his garden, and his pipe again — he found it pretty well 
filled from day today with interest of one sort and another; 
it did not, therefore, occur to him that Ethel, who accom- 
panied him a good deal in his little duties, was less en- 
grossed with them than himself, or that she pined for any 
other kind of life than that which, in his obstinate benevo- 
lence, he had judged best for his son and his son^s wife. 
Then he was not at all familiar with the ways of women, 
and was really rather afraid of them. Therefoi’e, the rest- 
lessness and the mopishness which he could not but observe 
in his daughter-in-law he attributed altogether to the con- 
dition into which, he believed, marriage always brings the 
gentle, suflfering, but somewhat irrational sex. He did not 
approve of his son’s being so much from home, but the 
wife had not complained openly about it, and he was not 
sure that he would be thanked by her if he interfered. 

But some day or two after the scene recorded in the end 
of our last chapter, seeing Ethel looking brighter and more 
buoyant, he bethought him that he should take the oppor- 
tunity, before the heats of summer came upon them, to 
arrange the long-delayed dinner which was to introduce 
his son’s wife to the neighbours. 

“ I’ve been thinking, Ethel, my dear,” said he, one 
morning after breakfast, “ that it’s about time we got that 
party up we’ve been putting off so long. Do you think 
you can stand it now, eh? strong enough, you know, and 
used enough to us, and that sort of thing?” 

“ Yes, father,” said Ethel, “ I think if we are going to 
have it, it is, as you say, about time.” 

“ And,” said the old man, “ you must get yourself a 
smart new bib and tucker. How’s your purse?’^ said he, 
suddenly, pulling out his pocket-book. “ Does your hus- 
band keep it supplied, eh?” 

“ Oh, yes, thank you,” said she. “ But what does Jack 
think about the party?” 

“ Oh, Jack,” said the father, as if his son’s opinion 
were of iio account. “ Well, what does Jack think?” 

” I think,” said Jack, “ since you ask me, that it will 
be a mistake.” 

“ Oh,” said his father, in a gruff burst of impatience^ 
” you always object to everything.” 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


187 


“ You may send out your invitations/^ said Jack, but 
very few will be accepted. Scarcely anybody is at home. 
It’s the height, you know, of the London season, and get- 
ting to the beginning of tlae seaside season. ” 

“Humph!” grunted his father, “what do you know 
about seasons? If people don’t come they can kay away, 
and we won’t miss ’em; we’ll have all the fun to ourselves, 
and bit and sup ’ll last the longer.” 

So the invitations were sent out, and the feast was pre- 
pared. It soon became apparent that Jack’s prognostica- 
tion would be fulfilled, and for this Jack’s father was in- 
clined in some way to hold him responsible. Three days 
before the day of the feast replies had been received to no 
more than half the invitations, and these, all but two, were 
“ regrets ” of “ inability to accept.” Then old Parkin, 
offended, rose to a business sense of the situation, and sent 
out telegrams east and west and south and Jiorth “ to 
summon his array ” of staunch old friends. They came; 
and the drawing-room of Sherborne Hall before dinner 
showed the oddest assortment of guests ever assembled to 
eat, drink, and be merry in company. 

The only neighbours who appeared were the Cardigans 
(of all people), and the curate of the parish. Of the rest, 
tlie most notable was a jovial, ruddy old fellow with a 
squint, a manufacturer from the West Riding (bis name 
was Kershaw), whose jokes old Parkin found very refresh- 
ing. The others (some dozen men and women) were of 
the Plymouth Brethren, who found Sherborne Hall so 
agreeable, and made it so cheerful of a Sunday. They 
were of all shades of complexion and degrees of theological 
fervour. One of them was barely in the room before he in- 
trepidly engaged the astonished Mr. Cardigan in a heady 
discussion about the rendering of a passage in the New 
Testament, a copy of which, in the origijial Greek, he drew 
from his tail pocket; while the manufacturer with the 
squint speedily set himself to divert, with strange stories in 
his native, unintelligible dialect, the handsome Miss Car- 
digan. 

Over dinner the Brethren and the clergyman were as 
much amazed as old Parkin was delighted with the gallant 
efforts of the jovial maker of shoddy to keep conversation 
from flagging. He was neyer tired or abashed. He spoke 


188 


A KEVERKlfD GENTLEMAN. 


to everybody with familiarity, he told stories, and fired off 
small jokes for the amusement of the table in general. 

“Beef!’' he would answer to the serving-man at his 
elbow. “ Ah, beefovQ I have any—" etc. 

“ Claret!" he exclaimed, “ 1 de67^^r'^7, I will." 

Yet he was neither exactly disagreeable nor vulgar. 
Nor was lie wanting in gentleness and observation. He 
was the only one who divined Ethel's nervousness and anx- 
iety as hostess, and who tried to relieve them. 

“Jack, my lad," said he to the son of his old friend, 
when the ladies had withdrawn, “ you’d better go and see 
after that nice little wife o’ yours, she bain't well, I can 
see, the 'ooney. " 

And later in the evening he took old Parkin himself 
aside in the drawing-room and said: “ Who's that big, 
dark, showy girl carrying on with your son? The parson's 
daughter, bain't she? and lives close by? Oh, ah, that's 
the girl you once thought he was going to wed. Well, 
John, you don’t ask my advice, but all the same, if you 
asked it, I would say, ‘ Send that Jack o’ yours away 
from home a while; tell him to take his little wife to 
seaside; she needs it.'" 

Altogether, the dinner, though not a failure, was a no- 
torious disappointment. It left in the hearts of the in- 
mates of Sherborne Hall a fruitful residue of bitter feel- 
ing. Jack felt ashamed of his father and his father's 
friends, and, in some sense, of his wife too, in the presence 
of neighbours. It was the first time he had seen Ethel and 
Miss Cardigan together, and his involuntary comparisons 
were not to Ethel's advantage. Jack's father was angry 
with his son, and felt he did well to be angry, for, while 
he was proud of Jack's education and good manners, he 
had seen them used only to poke fun at the guests who 
vvere not to his taste, and to flirt before his wife's eyes with 
a girl who had been his sweetheart before his marriage. 
Ethel, poor girl, was, I think, the most bitterly disap- 
pointed of the three. The anxieties of her position as 
hostess, and the sense of coming face to face, and having 
speech for the first time with her rival threw her into such 
a flutter of nervousness (which, in her condition, she had 
much to do to keep from becoming hysteria) that she be- 
lieved she neither did herself justice, nor pleased her hus- 
baud. The presence of Miss Cardigan, handsome and self- 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


189 


possessed, was, above all, a paralysing strain upon her. 
She felt her big, bright eyes upon her the whole evening, 
noticing her dress, her movements, and her words, and she 
despised herself for feeling so wretched and helpless under 
them. 

For a day or two Parkin senior smoked his pipe over 
the bit of advice tendered to him by his old friend Ker- 
shaw, and observed his son and his daughter-in-law. But 
all that he saw, or heard, or could imagine helped him lit- 
tle to a firm conclusion. Then he bethought him he would 
go to see the yeomanry drill, which took up so much of 
his song’s time. He tramped off to the scene of ma- 
ncBuvres, and saw the gay undisciplined prancings of the 
amateur cavalry-men, and saw, too, a little way off, on a 
knoll, a horsewoman, like a general surveying the field. 
He tramped round her way, to discover who she might be; 
saw it was Miss Cardigan; said his “ how-de-do;’^ and 
tramped home again. 

Not many hours after, he put his hand on EthePs shoul- 
der, while his rare sweet smile lit up his face. 

“ Let me look at you,” he said. “ No, no; this wonT 
do, you know, at all! What, eh? These cheeks are not 
what they were two or three months ago.” And he shyly 
tapped them with his forefinger. “ You must have a 
change — go to the seaside. Like that, hey? Your husband 
must take you. I’ll tell him.” 

“ Oh, please don’t,” said she. “ He is so taken up with 
his yeomanry at present. I am really very well, father — 
I am, indeed.” 

“ That’s all moonshine. A pretty yeomanry trick, if 
we let you go and fall ill. No, no; he must take you off 
to the seaside. I’ll tell him. ” 

This “telling” was taken more kindly by Mr. Jack 
than either his father or his wife expected. Certainly, he 
said, he was quite ready to take Ethel to the seaside; where 
should he take her? Had a place been thought of? No? 
Then, let him suggest Scarborough! Presently the reason 
came out; the yeomanry was going for fourteen days to 
Scarborough, and he should like to share their instruction 
there. 


190 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


CHAPTER XXX. 

CONJUGAL DISASTER. 

So, ill a day or two, Mr. and Mrs. Jack Parkin set off to 
Scarborough, Jack’s father determining at the last moment 
not to accompany them, but to come to them later; for, 
he said, a little of Scarborough went a long way with him. 
They were no more than settled in their lodgings (this 
time on St. Nicholas Olilf, opposite the Grand Hotel) than 
there appeared a second reason for Jack’s alacrity of dis- 
position for a sea-change: suddenly, one afternoon, when 
they turned from looking in a window on the Marine 
Parade, they encountered Miss Cardigan with an old lady 
on her arm. Both Jack and Miss Cardigan expressed sur- 
prise; but Ethel thought the surprise affected. Her hus- 
band’s arm trembled a little, and her own trembled in his 
a good deal. She was cold and stony to Miss Cardigan, 
and Miss Cardigan was defiant to her, but in a supercilious, 
good-natured fashion, as if her rival were of small account; 
The old lady, Mrs. Wantock, was very polite to Ethel, and 
hoped the change would be “ beneficial;” but Ethel was 
repelled by her searching, hawk-eyes, her aquiline nose, 
and her sensual lips, which were just beginning to sink, 
and bring nose and chin nearer together. 

Mrs. Wantock was the “ aunt at York,” who has been 
already mentioned, and she had probably seen a good deal 
of Jack Parkin before that afternoon. She was a wicked, 
incontinent old lady. I make haste to say that I do not 
use the word “ incontinent ” in the restricted sense in 
which the world commonly understands it. “ Inconti- 
nence,” it is said, “ is half of all the sins of man ” — and 
perhaps three-fourths of those of woman. But then there 
are several varieties of the vice, while there is none more 
base, or pernicious, than Incontinence of Tongue — in which 
Mrs. Wantock freely indulged. She sneered, she laughed, 
she insinuated, often she spoke outright about matters 
which the majority of mankind — at least of womankind — 
agree either to be altogether silent about or to hint at very 
timidly and carefully. This dreadful old woman had 
money, which it was expected she would leave (when, per- 
force^ her tenacious hold on it ceased) to Eleanor Cardigan; 


A BEVEKEND GENTLEMAK. 


191 


and on that account the girl washer very obedient servant; 
she went to her whenever she was summoned, and stayed 
with her till she was sent away; she walked with her, sat 
with her, and ate and drank with her, and listened to her 
suggestive revelations concerning herself and her piquant 
scandal about other people, and thus gradually became so 
subject to her influence, that intei-course with her had 
some of the fascination of vice. 

“ What does she want here?^^ exclaimed Ethel to her 
husband, when they had left the two. 

“ Who do you mean, mv dear?’^ said Jack. “Miss 
Cardigan?’^ 

“ Yes. She told me that night of the dinner that she 
always went to Scarborough in the season. This is not the 
season. 

“ Really, my dear, I don’t think she’s bound to ask you 
or me whether she may not come to Scarborough out of the 
season. But the fact is,” he added, in a conciliatory tone, 
“ she is always about with Mrs. Wan took — ” 

“ Like a lady’s-maid, or companion, or a creature of 
that sort, 1 suppose?” 

Jack winced, but he kept his temper. 

“ Mrs. Wantock’s her aunt,” said he, “ and she has ex- 
pectations from her. Wantock was a canon at York, or a 
big gun of some sort; he died a long while ago, but I’ve 
heard his widow never mourned him much. ” 

“ She looks a horribly unfeeling old thing,” said Ethel. 

“ She used to be very much the fashion,” said Jack. 

“ Fashion or no,” said Ethel, “ 1 don’t want to speak to 
her or to see her again.” 

“ I don’t think she will ask you to, my dear;” and so 
the matter dropped. 

But Ethel could not turn her attention from it. She 
was angry and ashamed that she should have indulged in 
that little burst of petulance. She was become jealous of 
Miss Cardigan again, she knew, but she was surprised that 
she had so little control of her feelings as to let the sudden 
sight of the woman light it into such a miserable sputter. 

It must be confessed that during those days our poor 
Ethel was anything but a cheerful companion. Her sus- 
picion of her husband — now all the deeper and bitterer that 
she had once accepted his protestations of innocence — her 


102 


A REVEllEND GENTLEMAN. 


mental distress allied to her physical trouble made her one 
quivering sensorium, so that she could have cried out with 
pain for little or no reason. 

Thus the fortnight of yeomanry instruction passed, and 
the month of July arrived. There was more than one ball 
given by and to the officers at this hotel and that; and 
Jack Parkin performed his martial and marital duty by 
going himself and taking his wife with him. But there 
duty ceased, and pleasure intervened. His wife, of course, 
must not dance, and it would have been too much to ex- 
pect that a young man who liked dancing, and who could 
dance, should abstain from the delirious pastime in order 
to sit with his wife or walk her about among plants or upon 
balconies. Yet he might have sat with his wife a little; 
when he danced he might have varied his partners more, 
and not have vexed his wife’s heart by touring so frequent- 
ly round the ball-room with his arm about Miss Cardigan, 
in the giddy and heating waltz. 

At last came a crisis, which could end only in disrup- 
tion. When the yeomanry departed. Jack (now called, by 
courtesy perhaps, “ Captain Parkin”) was free to devqte 
himself to his wife. He took her “ on the Spa,” whither 
all visitors resort in their most fashionable attire, morning 
and evening, to hear the band play, to march up and down 
the asphalted promenade, or to sit in shady bowers nestling 
in the Cliff Gardens, and look out upon the sunlit sea, 
where ships and steamers come and go, and jaunty boats 
with white sails skim and dance about. But, by the doc- 
tor’s advice, she went to her room of an afternoon to rest 
— a point of obedience to medical rule which Jack much 
commended. 

It happened one day — it was the afternoon of a Friday 
— that she could not rest when she retired as usual to her 
room. It was very hot, and through her open window she 
was disturbed by the sounds of flymen prowling for fares 
and bandying mutual terms of reproach, and by the shrill, 
vernacular cries of boys retailing the first edition of the 
evening newspaper. Her husband, too (whom she had left 
to his nap in the sitting-room below), had troubled her at 
lunch with a behaviour more than usually silent and preoc- 
cupied, which she could not help thinking of now. The 
longer she lay with her eyes closed, with all her attention 
fixed upon this grievance, the larger it swelled with mean- 


A REVEKEND GEJS^TLEMAN. 


193 


ing. Her husband was removing farther and farther from 
her, his love was growing more and more weary and cold. 

“ I have tried, she said to herself — “ oh, surely I have 
tried! to be, as far as I had opportunity, a loving wife, a 
true helpmeet to him. Have 1 denied him anything? 1 
have loved him — ah, none could love him more! And he 
loved me; but now he does not care for me; he is tired of 
me! Why? — why? It is not that he has known me so 
long — that we have been married so long — but only that — 
she has come between us! If it were not for her, I know 1 
would keep him with me; I would help him in spite of 
himself; 1 would make him be something, and do some- 
thing! Oh, my dear, my dear, what can I do, to help 
myself and to save you?^^ 

Then it came to her like an inspiration that if she ap- 
pealed to Miss Cardigan to go away, to no longer try to 
lead her husband astray, all might go well; the girl, sure- 
ly, must have a heart, and did not know, probably, the 
pain and ruin she was causing by her foolish flirtation. 
She had so worked herself up that it seemed the most natu- 
ral thing that she should at once endeavour to see Miss Car- 
digan, and state the case; on so warm an afternoon Mrs. 
Wan took would, no doubt, be resting, and Miss Cardigan 
would not be far from her. 

She rose, put her hair and her dress in order, put on her 
hat, took her parasol, and, full of her errand, went down- 
stairs and out of the house. Mrs. Wantock^s lodgings were 
in the Crescent, and in less than ten minutes she was at 
the door, which stood open, no doubt because of the heat. 
She did not need to knock or ring, for a woman of the 
house espied her from the end of the hall, and approached 
with a look of inquiry. 

“ 1 want to see Miss Cardigan, if she is in,’^ said Ethel. 

“ I think she is with Mrs. Wautock,"’ said the woman. 
“Will you step into the drawing-room, and Fll go up and 
see?’^ 

So saying, she pushed open a door near at hand, which 
was slightly ajar, and admitted Ethel to the drawing-room. 
The poor girl stood a moment or two in a flutter of nerv- 
ousness, uncertain whether she had done well to come, try- 
ing to encourage herself against a cold reception. As she 
stood, she became conscious of subdued voices at hand. 
She looked about her; there was no one; but there was a 
r 


104 


A REVEREND GENtLEmAN. 


room beyond, divided from the room in which she was by 
curtains partly drawn; the voices must come from thence. 
Suddenly a low laugh sounded familiar in her ear, and 
drew her, almost before she was aware, to the curtains. 
With trembling hand she put one back a little, and — alas 
for love, and faith, and hope! — she saw her husband with 
Miss Cardigan in his arms! Her first impulse was to turn 
and flee; her next — upon which she acted — was to enter 
and show herself. Her husband was the first to see her. 
He started to his feet with a suppressed oath, and stood as 
if he would hide his paramour; for at that moment his 
usually gentle wife looked, as indeed she felt, as if she 
would have killed Miss Cardigan had she the strength. 

“ What the deuce have you come here for?” he demand- 
ed, angrily. 

At the sound of his voice all her love for him seemed to 
be unclasped and to fall from her like a cloak. All her 
patience with him, her excuses for him were forgotten; her 
former humility in his presence was gone; she stood before 
him an outraged wife with the responsibility of wifehood 
upon her. 

“ I came to see Miss Cardigan,” she panted, “ I did not 
expect to find you here, though I might have guessed!” 

“Well,” said he, “ doiiH let us have a scene here.” 
(For he had perceived behind Ethel the woman of the 
house, who, seeing how matters were, had precipitately 
withdrawn.) “ Come away home.” 

“I don’t want you to go home with me!” she cried. 
“ I don’t want you to go anywhere with me! I don’t want 
you at all! Stay with the woman you prefer to me! that 
wicked woman, who has tempted you from me ever since 
we were married!” 

“Wicked!” cried Miss Cardigan, flashing up like an 
angry bird. “ He was mine before you knew him! You 
took him from me, and caught him with your soft plausi- 
bleness! Y'ou speak of wickedness! You were very good 
— were you not? before he married you! — married you be- 
cause he could not in any other way get out of the scrape 
you had got him into!” 

“ He has told you that?” she said, looking wildly from 
the one to the other. “ He has spoken like that about me 
to you?” She felt stricken almost passionless. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 195 

“ Ethel/^ put in her husband, “ you are excited;’^ but 
she did not heed him. 

“Perhaps I took him from you! perhaps that’s true: 
and this is my punishment. I have tried to be a true wife 
to him, in all love and obedience; but he did not want 
that; he is tired of me. Take him back to yourself alto- 
gether! I give him to you! Only take care that he does 
not vex your heart as he has vexed and broken mine! 
Some day he may see another woman who takes his fancy, 
when he has got used to you; then you will, perhaps, know 
something of what I feel now! I am ashamed I should 
have loved such a man!” 

She turned to go, dazed and trembling. Miss Cardigan 
hung her head in silence. She had some good feeling left. 
Mr. Jack Parkin, seeing his wife totter as she passed again 
through the curtains, put forth his hand to help her. She 
shrunk away from him. 

“ Don’t touch me. Jack!” she said in a voice of grief. 
“ I can go by myself.” And so she passed out into the 
glare of the sunlight, and found her way back to their 
lodging, using her parasol as a staff. The few people who 
were about stared at the young lady who passed, so strange 
in her looks, so unsteady in her gait. What could be the 
matter? Was she drunk? 

Mr. Jack Parkin, left standing in Mrs. AVantock’s draw- 
ing-room, was surely in the most unenviable situation mor- 
tal man ever occupied. He could not return to Miss Car- 
digan’s side; he was ashamed to go with his wife; between 
the two, he left the house in as sneaking a fashion as a 
young man with something of a military bearing could 
leave. 

“ Good-bye, Nell,” said he. 

“ Good-bye,” said she; and that was all. 

Illicit passion, with both, had not been thus far a very 
encouraging experience. 

Ethel, returned to the lodgings on St. Nicholas Cliff, 
went up to her room at once. She had but one idea: 
to get away to her own people — to her father, who 
seemed to her now the dearest and gentlest of men, and 
especially to her sister Kate, in whose love she knew she 
could rest. Her feeling had been on the strain so long 
that now, when she felt it was all over between herself and 
her husband, it was with something of a sense of relief. 


196 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


She was entirely apathetic, except on this point, that she 
must get away at once to her sister’s arms to rest — to rest 
— perhaps to die. 

Hurriedly she put a few things into a small bag, de- 
scended into the street, beckoned to a cab, and was driven 
to the station. In half an hour she was on her way to 
London. 


CHAPTER XXXI. 

LAUGHTER AND TEARS. 

The Reverend William Merrydew at this time was getting 
to think himself, after all, a person of some consequence. He 
was very properly elated that his “ Notes of Wild Wales ” 
(of which we have heard) had been printed in so notable a 
paper as the “ Pall Mall Gazette ” — “ without any introduc- 
tion, too, you know,” as he assured everybody to whom he 
mentioned his good fortune; he was pleased with the honest 
homage and the open flattery paid him by the good-nat- 
ured bohemian household in Percy Circus; and he plumed 
himself on the possession of one daughter who was show- 
ing she had a musical talent he had hitherto known noth- 
ing of (he had no ear himself), and of another who was the 
contented and happy wife of the heir to very considerable 
wealth and estate — for Ethel had written to him to declare 
that the “ insinuations ” of the anonymous correspondent 
of George Cardigan “ were most spiteful and untrue.” 

He was so jubilant and self-confident, he saw so close at 
hand all that he had been longing and striving for (striving 
for, it must be conceded, more in imagination than in fact) 
— the enjoymeiiLof all things that are good for food, sweet 
to the taste, or pleasant to the eye, and the attainment of 
refined surroundings and social consideration— that, if it 
had not been the people of the house were so agreeable and 
so kind, he would have given notice at once, and removed 
again to finer apartments. But, fortunately, he did noth- 
ing so foolish or precipitate. He reckoned up, however, 
how long the composition ^f his articles had taken him, 
and divided into the number of pounds he had been paid 
for them, and then regulated his expenditure accordingly. 
He was now a journalist, and would go on earning to the 
same tune as he had already been paid. He was not really 
such a fool as to believe that one set of articles makes a 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


197 


journalist any more than that one swallow makes a summer; 
but he had convinced himself by some incomprehensible 
process that the harder he assured himself he was a jour- 
nalist with a reputation to sustain, a state to maintain, and 
an income to make, the more easily would he be a journal- 
ist with reputation, state, and income. 

Merrydew — I must here record as a fact in his favour 
(and presently, I fear, he will be found to fall away so 
much from grace and reverence that every fact in his favour 
will have to be remembered) — in these days Merrydew 
really tried to work with an ambitious aim, tried, perhaps, 
in a somewhat unused, half-ineffectual, quinquagenarian 
fashion, but still he tried. His “ chief (as he proudly 
called the clever gentleman who then sat in the editorial 
chair of the “ P. M. when he spoke of him to Bottiglia 
or the other denizens of Percy Circus) had written to him 
that he would “ gladly consider anything he might send, 
and, therefore, he felt in some sort commissioned to find 
suitable copy. This was not very easy; for he could not 
write unless he had something that interested him to write 
about; he lacked the light and agreeable knack of the 
practised journalist, the manufacturer of the leading arti- 
cle — gratis anlielans, multa agendo nihil agens — who can 
write a great deal, with an air of confidence and convic- 
tion, about nothing. Such matter as he had put into his 
“ Notes of Wild Wales was not at hand every day. He 
wrote a “ descriptive article on Bottiglia^s “ Emporium 
of Curios and Antiques/^ alluding pathetically to his own 
small investment therein, but he was depressed by its re- 
turn with a “ regret that it was not quite suitable.^’ Then 
he began to pry into corners of London, where something 
of human, even if nasty, interest could be found; he had 
agreeable adventures in the New Cut of a Saturday night, 
and in Petticoat Lane, and the once noisy “ Brilf of a 
Sunday, but the glory of these places had departed, and 
he knew they had already been “ done by writers who 
had a wider and deeper acquaintance with London life than 
he had; so nothing came of his excursions except a very lit- 
tle satisfaction to himself that he was gathering experience. 
At length he had what he considered a very happy idea. 
His fellow-lodgers in Percy Circus, and the people of the 
house were curiously varied and interesting; he had joined 
in several impromptu entertainments they had given in the 


198 


A REVEEKND GENTLEMAN". 


parlour or in the front kitchen. Suppose he gave them all 
an entertainment in return? Then he would write an ac- 
count of it, and take care to divert the reader with a lively 
description of the oddity of his guests. He would ask 
George Cardigan, too, who had lately become a pretty fre- 
quent visitor, and who made himself very much at home 
both upstairs and down. 

Thus it happened that on that very Friday which we 
have noted as so unlucky at Scarborough, Mr. Merrydew 
was preparing a feast for his friends. The feast was to 
take the form of a supper, and was intended to be a sur- 
prise; but since it was impossible to keep the necessary 
preliminaries in the kitchen quite secret, the news of the 
entertainment rose and spread over the house, with the 
odours of cooking. Tessa, the Italian niece, whispered it to 
“ Zio Bottiglia, who exclaimed, “Hey? Al diavolo !” 
pulled up his dirty shirt-collar, and incontinently resolved 
to contribute a pound of Bologna sausage and a flask of 
Chianti. That was on Thursday evening; for Kate’s 
teaching engagements would leave her no time for cooking 
on Friday, and Friday evening was fixed for the feast, be- 
cause Saturday being holiday for all teachers she could rest 
after her dissipations. Saturday evening was not chosen, 
because then everybody went to market for Sunday. 

At nine o’clock on Friday evening Mr. Merrydew rang 
the bell, and sent Jenny (the girl of twelve) with his own 
and his daughter’s compliments to every one in the house 
— and they would be pleased if every one would join them 
at supper. It was everybody’s cue to be taken very much 
by surprise, and to say, “ Law! ain’t it kind, now?” 
This polite exclamation even Tessa and Bottiglia took up 
and tried to utter. In a very few minutes Bottiglia ap- 
peared bowing and smiling, with his face freshly washed (a 
considerable concession to the usages of society) and wear- 
ing a new and very brilliant necktie. Then came the rest, 
one by one, and shyly, declaring one and all, that Mr. 
Merrydew should not have put himself to so much trouble; 
it was noticeable that though they were taken at unawares 
they were more carefully and finely arrayed than usual. 
Pentecost, the young poet, was out when the invitation was 
carried to his room, so he did not appear till later. Even 
the hermit of the second-floor front put in an appearance, 
but seeing such an assemblage of people he subsided into a 


A REVEREI^D GENTLEMAN-. 


199 


chair near the door, where he sat bewildered for a few min- 
utes, and then slipped away unnoticed, and was seen no 
more. Then George Cardigan arrived, and the supper 
began — when Bottiglia^s present was discovered, and Bot- 
tiglia was convicted of it. 

“Ah, what a devil!” said he. “It is nothing. It is 
garnish only to ze table.” 

The 'piece cle resistance of the feast was cold roast beef 
with — yes, with lobster salad, that most delightful but 
most indigestible of all salads, which Miss Merrydew had 
prepared with her own fair fingers. Never were guests so 
well waited on at any Belgravian, Tyburnian or Kensing- 
tonian feast; when anything was wanted, or when the 
plates had to be changed, one or two of the ladies slipped 
quietly from their places, and the thing was done. 

But it is unnecessary for me to describe the whole feast 
and to narrate the droll things that were uttered, since the 
article in which Merrydew himself describes and narrates 
all may still be referred to in the “ Mayfair Magazine. ” 
Suffice it that Merrydew^s guests acted on the first principle 
of “ Politeness from Home “ Enjoy, or at least appear 
to enjoy, whatever is set before you; be as merry as you 
can without overstepping the bounds of modesty.” In- 
deed, what with the elaborate court paid by Merrydew to 
the old lady, the burlesque love-making between Kate and 
Signor Bottiglia, in which each sang little snatches at the 
other, after the manner of la prima donna and il tenore at 
the opera — whither Kate had been conducted now and 
again by the Italian — (“ 11 resta capira,” warbled Kate, 
handing him the salad) and the very real little flirtation car- 
ried on between the good-natured George Cardigan and the 
pretty little school-mistress, they were so very merry that 
they found when it was all over that they had eaten little. 

“Law!” exclaimed the lively old lady, wiping her eyes 
after a fit of laughter, “ we couldn’t be merrier if it was a 
lord mayor’s banquet!” A declaration which those who 
have sat at lord mayors’ banquets will know how to ap- 
preciate. 

“ ‘ A merry heart doeth good like a medicine,’ ” quoted 
Merrydew. 

“And Merry-dew means Honey-dew, doesn’t it?’ said 
Cardigan — a sweet compliment which all applauded. 

After supper the merriment did not slacken, but rather 


200 


A KEVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


increased; it became marked, too, with a little incoherence 
here and there which was no doubt due to the heat (which 
was great, in spite of doors and windows being open) and 
not at hll to the after-supper punch which the host had 
brewed. Then it was that some of the younger people, in 
spite of the lateness of the hour (it was half past ten), in- 
sisted upon descending to the parlour to dance; never, sure- 
ly, was there an English house so given to dancing as that. 
Kate accompanied them to play. During a stifling pause 
after a waltz, while the dancers sat round the room fan- 
ning themselves with handkerchiefs, newspapers, or sheets 
of music — while one or two even ventured into the draught 
of the passage — she went to the open window and looked 
out upon the silent, heavy, fetid night, and somehow felt 
very lonely. How good-natured, how kind all these people 
were; yet how tired she was of them and their harmless 
jocosities. The women were good and simple, but silly 
(though she felt that merely to think so was ungrateful); 
they would not, she thought, understand her disappoint- 
ments, her anxieties, and her fears if she spoke of them. 
She almost wished she could be as light, as bird-like, and 
careless of the morrow as the little school- mistress was — 
and that she could worry as little about to-night^s and sim- 
ilar expenses as she would. But some, she told herself, 
seem born to bear anxieties, which others are born to put 
upon them. As she stood and mused, and looked out, a 
cab appeared toiling up the steep ascent. As it came 
under the light of the neighbouring lamp, she saw a woman’s 
face looking out at the doors of the houses. At length it 
came in line with herself and stopped. The cabman de- 
scended from his box and let a lady out. Who could it be? 

“ Miss Merrydew,” called a voice from the passage, 
“ you’re wanted.” 

Hurriedly she went out, wondering. 

Kate!” cried a voice she well knew. 

“ Why, it’s Ethel!” she exclaimed in delight; and next 
moment the sisters were hugging and kissing each other as 
only fond women can. But a great sob heaved and broke 
from Ethel’s heart. “ Oh, my dear!” cried Kate, in un- 
restrained alarm and distress. “ What?” 

Every word, of course, was overheard; a sympathetic 
silence passed upon all, for it was felt that deep trouble of 
some sort had entered the house. 


A REVEKEKD GENTLEMAN. 


201 


Kate led her sister at once upstairs to her father. Proba- 
bly it was almost as much from the bitter consciousness 
which then invaded her that her father and sister had been 
eating and drinking and making merry while she was 
plunged in woe— ^as much from that as from the desolation 
of her heart and the fatigue of her journey — that Ethel 
lapsed into a fit of hysteria, in which she heaved sobs that 
seemed to rend her breast, sat rigid, or clung wildly to her 
sister, while her father stroked her head and patted her, 
almost unconscious of what he was about, but feeling 
vaguely that here was a terrible defeat of plans and hopes, 
and vaguely fearing what was to come. 

All the guests had gone out from them, and sat below 
engaged in solemn whisperings and head-shakes. George 
Cardigan, as an old friend of the Merrydew family, was 
beset with questions, which were not, however, too press- 
ing. His answers were brief, not to say gruff, for he sus- 
pected what the cause of the emotion upstairs was. In- 
deed, a very quick ear might have overheard him, as he 
paced to and fro, and as the painful sounds from the draw- 
ing-room reached him, mutter oftener than once, “ Damn 
him!^^ He waited for some time in the hope of being 
summoned upstairs, and then he went away, leaving word 
that he would call in the morning. 


CHAPTER XXXII. 

BOTTIGLIA ADVISES. 

That Friday night was memorable in the annals of 10 
Percy Circus. When Merrydew had seen Ethel calmer and 
taken by Kate to her room, he found himself so wide- 
awake, and so much in need of somebody to talk to, that 
he descended into the lower parts of the house to see who 
might be still astir. He found the whole company in the 
usual place of evening concourse, the front kitchen. They 
sat or reclined in somnolent attitudes, talking only in the 
lowest of tones, or not" at all; they were evidently expecting 
something to happen; they felt that a distinguished honour 
had been done the house by the entrance of such woe, 
and they could not go to bed till they knew the extent of 
it. They all turned when Merrydew appeared. 

“ Ah, Mr. Merrydew,"' said the little old lady sadly, 
“ this must be a rare trouble for you. And you so com- 


20:2 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


fortable f o-Dight, too! But, there; trouble’s ill-convenient, 
come when it will! How is she now, poor thing?” 

“ She is better, thank you,” said he, “a little better. 
She has gone to bed with her sister.” 

“ Ah,” said the landlady. “ You’ll want a double bed 
in that room now, I daresay.” 

“ Well, really, Mrs. Bolder,” he answered, “ I can’t say 
yet. I — I don’t know how long she may stay. 1 don’t 
know what she has come for; though I guess she has had 
some — some little quarrel with her husband. Young mar- 
ried people, you know, make a deal of trouble out of very 
little.” 

“ And that, I’m sure, they do,” said the old lady. 
“Oh, yes.” 

“ Not,” said Merrydew, “ but that there may have been 
something out of the common to send her here like this; 
for her husband is a wild young fellow. He is a sort of 
gentleman at large, you see; a very dangerous kind of 
creature; for ‘ Satan,’ you know, ‘ finds some mischief still.’ 
That’s the worst,” added he, with the least spice of brag, 
“ of having plenty of money in hand, and in prospect.” 

“ He’ll come into a rare lot of property, 1 suppose,” said 
the little old lady, with much respect. 

“ Yes,” said he, “ though it would be very much better 
for him if he had to earn his living like me and Bottiglia. ” 
And he looked about him — and felt, indeed — as if he were 
in the habit of toiling very hard. 

” Ah, si, si,” exclaimed Bottiglia from his corner, where 
he was going to sleep. 

“ 1 think,” said Merrydew, “ that before I go to bed 1 
should like a turn in the open air. Will you come, Bot- 
tiglia?” 

“ Oh, ves,” exclaimed he, rousing himself with alacrity. 
“Certainly.” 

So they went out together, and the women looked at 
each other, and wondered whether they had better wait for 
Bottiglia’s return, on the chance of his being able and will- 
ing to impart some fuller revelation of the mystery up- 
stairs, or whether they had better go to bed at once. They 
heard twelve boom softly and sleepily through the warm, 
fetid air from Westminster, and that decided them; they 
went to bed. 

And Merrydew, as he strolled with Bottiglia past the 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


203 


closing public-houses, which were pushing or ejecting rudely 
their belated patrons out upon the pavement, past the fes- 
tive odours of the fried-fish bars, past the cheerful vendor 
of baked potatoes, on to King’s Cross, and up the dreary 
slope of Pentonville as far as the noisy, draggled, and vile- 
mouthed Angel, and back again by Sadler’s Wells and 
Claremont Square, poured himself out to his companion, 
lie lamented his want of success in all his enterprises; he 
liad married a wife whose fortune proved illusory, and who 
had died before he could appreciate her personal value; he 
had been disappointed in his profits from school-keeping; 
he had been wearied and disgusted with his Welsh living; 
he had encountered a favourite old pupil — the young man 
who had come, seen, and conquered, and married his best- 
beloved daughter, his Ethel — and he had thought that at 
length his luck had turned, but that hope, too, was now' 
failing him. He told of the anonymous letter received by 
George Cardigan, and how he suspected Ethel’s husband 
had been carrying on wiih Cardigan’s sister Claudes tinel}", 
until now something disgraceful had appeared to drive his 
daughter to her father’s arms. 

Diavvlo said Bottiglia. “I know the man he is, 
the beast! We have many of him in my country. What 
you think we do? We kill him. My friend, you must kill 
him I” 

“ Yes,” said Merrydew, “ if we were m Italy I might, 
or Cardigan might, go and find him out and kill him, or we 
both might, and then flee to the mountains and turn brig- 
ands. But in England, my dear Bottiglia, there are no 
mountains for me to flee to, except in Wales — and the 
Lord preserve me from having to go back to Wales! 1 
want, by the help of Providence and a pot of ink and a 
pen, to be able to stay in London.” 

“ Ah, si,” said Bottiglia with conviction; “you have 
reason. Well, now — what a devil! See, 1 have here in 
London compatriots, men of honour, and what you say 
hearts; they will do anything for me — anything. I say to 
this one, or that one, ‘ ’St!’ and he come. Then I say to 
him in the ear, ‘ My friend, the Reverend Don Merrydew, 
what is of the Church, and must not put a little stiletto 
into a man in the back, he is hurt very much in his honour 
and his heart; a villain have touch his daughter — pardon; 
the villain husband of his daughter have done the oder 


204 


A kp:verend gentleman. 


thing. You will find him — I will tell you where — and 
you will put a stiletto into him to the heart, si?^ And my 
compatriot will do what I ask him.'^ 

“ Eeally, Bottiglia/’ said Merrydew, a little wryly, “ the 
extent of your friendship overwhelms me. You are re- 
markably good. But — well — your way is not quite our 
way of punishing such errors. Perhaps our way does not 
do us so much honour, shows we have colder hearts—’^ 

“ Ah, now, why?^' interrupted Bottiglia. “ Every coun- 
try have his fashion. An Englishman fights with fist — very 
well. An Italian fight with knife — very well. It is fash- 
ion. 

“For my part,^^ said Merrydew, “I must confess I 
don’t want to fight either with knife or with fist. If Mr. 
Jack Parkin has really behaved so that my daughter can- 
not live with him as wife, without dishonour, then I shall 
make him bleed in an organ where men now-a-days are 
most sensitive, in his pocket, my friend. That may seem 
poor-spirited — ” 

“ But, no; you have reason,” said Bottiglia, ready to 
accommodate his own opinion to his companion’s. “ It is 
very good plan.” 

“ It may even seem mercenary,” said Merrydew. “ But 
I go upon the saying in Scripture, ‘ A living dog is better 
than a dead lion.’ ” 

“ Good; that is in ze Holy Scripture — eh?” 

“ If Mr. Jack Parkin has really misbehaved he shall pay 
for it, as we say! But I must have evidence that he has, 
and to get that 1 must go down to Yorkshire. But, my 
friend, I have no money. Now, I want to ask you, Bot- 
tiglia — you won’t be offended? — if there is any prospect of 
realising upon that marble mantel-piece. Could you, do 
you think, let me have an advance upon it?” 

“Ah, now, I am very much sorry!” And indeed he 
seemed affected with genuine distress. “I have not — no, 
I have not, my friend, no more than that;” and he pulled 
out a handful of silver — “ I would give you my watch — it 
would what you say spout for ten pounds or fifteen, but I 
have give it this very day to a compatriot, a poor devil of 
sculptor. Look-a-see;” and he showed his empty chain. 
“ Ah, now, I am desolate for this. But to-morrow or 
Monday I go to see if a gentleman is at home; he owe me 
money, a somme, for two very nice bronze.” 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


205 


So, with the hope of what next day or Monday might 
bring, Merrydew was forced to be content; he thanked his 
friend, and they went indoors to bed. 

From this talk it will be readily understood that Merry- 
dew had already almost come to the conclusion, notwith- 
standing his daughter’s former disclaimer and her present 
silence, that Jack Parkin had given his wife sufficient 
cause for jealousy and flight, and that he was already 
amiably computing what advantage might be taken of this 
crisis in the family affairs. But in the morning he found 
that the prospect had less of hope in it for him than he 
had expected. He heard from Kate, who appeared at 
breakfast without her sister, that Jack Parkin had been 
surprised by his wife in the act of “ holding and kissing a 
dreadful sister of poor George Cardigan,” to whom, it ap- 
peared, he had been “ a kind of engaged ” before his mar- 
riage, and with whom he had been carrying on — Ethel be- 
lieved — ever since; he heard this, and saw at once that 
however guilty his daughter might feel her husband to be, 
there was no proper incriminating evidence of his unfaith- 
fulness, and he wished to Heaven he could only raise enough 
money to go down to Yorkshire and “ settle the question. ” 

By-and-bye it was settled in a way he did not expect. 

Early in the afternoon George Cardigan called, in a cab 
with a portmanteau on the roof. His “ governor ” in the 
Temple, he said, had told him that morning he might take 
his holiday as soon as he liked, so he had packed his few 
traps and was going home at once — “ glad to get out of 
this baking, beastly London ” — he had just called on his. 
way to the station to ask if-— if there was any messages, any- 
thing he could do — and the young man pulled hard at his 
new gloves, and blushed a good deal. 

“Thank you,” said Kate, and looked at her father. 
“ I don’t know that we have a message for any one.” 

“ How is your sister to-day? Mrs. Parkin, 1 mean,” 
asked George. 

“ She is quieter, thank you— but she is very prostrate.” 

This was said with such precision and resolute reserve 
that poor George was quite abashed. 

“ Oh, yes,” said he, scarcely knowing what he said, but 
trying now to catch Merrydew’s eye, who, for his part, was 
fidgetting about the window and wishing he, too, could go 
to Yorkshire. “1 think I must be going.” Just then 


206 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


Merrydew turned, and with a jerk of his head he beckoned 
him out. 

“ Ah/^ said Merrydew, “ I think I might go to the sta- 
tion with you, and see you off.^^ 

When they were in the cab, George took from his 
an envelope, and handed it to Merrydew, saying, 
read that — another of the same/’ 

Merrydew took from the envelope a half -sheet of paper, 
and read: 

“ Dear sir this is for to tel yow over agin plainer wat 1 
rote you before moast partickler and yow av took no 
knowtis young mister parkin wil be the ruination off your 
sister as likewys he as off uther pore girls and is pore wife 
two wich he as cum ome this min nit and ast at the doar 
is my wife cum ome but she aynt hoping yow wil tek 
warnin in tyme befoar it is two let for your sister piece off 
mind and figger. A frend ” 

With this, hope sprang suddenly again in Merrydew’s 
breast, the reason for which he did not pause to consider 
before he said: “This young woman — I suppose it’s a 
oung woman — has evidently not come in for many of the 
enefits of School Boards; but she writes with feeling; per- 
haps she has herself been a victim. ” 

“ Isn’t he a brute — a scoundrel?” broke forth George. 
“ Don’t you think he is?” 

“ I do, certainly; I do. But v/hat, now, what — to be 
practical — do you propose to do?” 

“Do! He’d be maimed for life if I had my will of 
him!” 

“ Bottiglia,” said Merrydew, “ proposed to me last 
night to kill him. ” 

“ Killing’s too good for him,” said George. 

“ Certainly your way is better, on the score of barbarity. 
But, come now, what good will it do to talk of either kill- 
ing or maiming? We won’t do either, you know. We 
must think of some civilised punishment.” 

“ By G— d, sir!” cried George. “ Do you know what 
he has done?” 

“ I know what he is accused of doing.” 

“ I am a mild enough fellow at most times!” exclaimed 
George, struggling with the honest passion that pressed 
for utterance. “ But if 1 find it true about — about my 


pocket 
“ Just 


A RETEKEirD GE2^TLEMA1?‘. 


207 


sisterhood God! my dear Nell, that I used to think as 
beautifoi and good as an angel!’’ he paused a moment and 
looked out of the window, and Merrydew heard a sugges- 
tive sound of swallowing— “ I’U wring his neck— by God, 
1 wilL” 

Now, my dear fellow,” reasoned Merrydew, “ don’t 
let us swear prodigious vows of vengeance. I feel as 
strongly against him as you do, and at your time of life 1 
would have been as determined to smite and slay. But 
my blood runs a little more cautiously than it once did, and 
1 am able to look a little farther ahead. If Jack Parkin 
has really done all we suspect him of, 1 won’t spare him, 1 
asure you. But first we must be assured that he has. 
Now, don’t go and do anything rash — let me advise you — 
examine and inquire carefully, and write to me what you 
find out, and then we can consult together. ” 


CHAPTEE XXXIII. 

3IEERTDEW EXPRESSES AN OPINION. 

Merrydew, no doubt, made a mistake in thus trying to 
reason with the young man; he made him only more ob- 
stinately fixed in his own view of what his line of conduct 
should be. What that exactly was he did not tell Merry- 
dew, since he encouraged him so little in it. However, he 
promised to write — and so they parted. Not hearing from 
George Cardigan within two or three days, he reflectSi that 
it might be well, though it were only as a matter of form, 
to write to Jack Parkin asking for an explanation of his 
wife’s flight, and what he prop(5ed to do under the circum- 
stances^ He wrote and wait^. 

There ensued one, two, three, almost four long, weary 
weeks, during which the most harassing anxiety hung 
about the father and his two daughters, and haggard pov- 
erty came and cast its shadow on them. For the first few 
da^ Ethel was sunk in apathy, and her father, as he sat 
with her in their sitting-room trying to be smart and jocose 
in the description he was writing of the Friday evening 
feast, felt oppre^ed with her presence, till the oppression 
turned to acute irritation, and he could not refrain from 
attempting to rouse her rather sharply. 

‘‘ Why don’t you, my dear child,” said he, “ get some- 
thing to’ occupy your mind with?— at any rate, to occupy 


^08 


A REVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


your fingers with? Moping like that won't mend matters; 
it only depresses your own spirits lower and lower, and — 
and the spirits of those about you. Rouse yourself, my 
dear, and try to shake it off." 

Upon which his sad, soft-hearted daughter looked re- 
proachfully at him, and rose and went into her bedroom, 
whence presently he heard smothered sounds of sobbing. 
Then he laid down his pen in a fresh spasm of irritation, 
and declared to himself that there was no understanding 
women, or guessing what they would be at; yet, he re- 
flected, he had encouraged, in some measure, his daughter's 
marriage, and it did not become him to be impatient with 
her because he found her deep regret for a worthless hus- 
band inscrutable. So he went to her to comfort her, but 
she would not listen to him. 

“ Please, father," she said, “ leave me to myself; 1 am 
best by myself. Let me sit here, and then I won't worry 
you." 

“ Here " was the window looking out upon a little well 
of a back yard, lumbered with bits of furniture, old and 
bleached, broken crockery, and worn kettles and saucepans, 
that after hard service upstairs and down, had been cast 
out into this Gehenna. 

When he had opportunity of a word with Kate by her- 
self, he urged her to use her influence with Ethel — “ Get 
her to go out a little or something, or else we shall be hav- 
ing her ill, you know." 

Kate perceived the necessity of this. She at once put 
on her hat agarin — she had just returned from her weari- 
some teaching duties — and went to take her sister out for 
a walk in Regent's Park. Ethel did not wish to go, but 
Kate persuaded, and finally insisted. 

“ 1 know the park is a good way off," said she, handing 
Ethel her hat; “ yes, of course, the streets are baking hot, 
too — but we'll take the 'bus. Come, now, dear, you must 
go out, or you'll be ill." 

So the sisters went to Regent's Park, and looked at the 
gorgeous flower-beds, and walked in the shade of the chest- 
nut-trees among the children and the dallying nurse-maids, 
and were themselves a good deal stared at by the friends 
of the nurse-maids, the young men of doubtful appearance, 
whose only occupation, as distinct from the pleasures of 
flirtation, seems to be to sit on a bench and read the news- 


A KEVEREKD GENTLEMAN. 


^09 


paper. And, indeed, they were attractive enough to have 
made better men than the park loafers turn and look; 
both so fair and sweet, of so supple and graceful a car- 
riage, of such striking similarity of face and figure, yet the 
one so calm and resolute-looking, that she seemed the taller 
by two or three inches, and the other so gentle and shy, 
that a glance of admiration distressed her, and made her 
hold tighter by her sister^s arm. 

When they returned they found their father in such 
spirits that Kate fancied he must have “ realised upon 
that very secure investment he had made with Bottiglia — 
of which she had by this time heard. What had happened 
to him? He had merely had “ a bright idea in connec- 
tion with the article he was writing — to bring in, namely, 
at the end, much as it had occurred, the return of a dis- 
tressed damsel to her home. Marvellous are the compen- 
sations of Art! Merrydew, surely after all, was a born 
writer when he could forget all the disappointment and the 
threatening anxiety of his life because he had made a satis- 
factory stroke of the pen. 

Alas! it was the last touch of genuine pleasure that his 
literary performances gave him. “ The Pall Mall Ga- 
zette declined his article — so did “ The 'Age,” which 
daily mumbles with dignity the opinions and sentiments of 
a generation ago, and which was doubtless astonished by 
the offer of our reverend friend^s flippant composition; and 
so did “The Daily Wire,^^ whose articles are always dis- 
tinguished by brevity and point. “ The Tale of a Supper 
at last found refuge, and saw the light some months after- 
wards, iu the pages of “ The Mayfair Magazine ” — when 
its publication was of small moment to its author. But I 
am anticipating. 

Daily for about a fortnight Kate took her sister to Re- 
gent’s Park by the omnibus, but at the end of that time, 
leisure becoming abundant, and money scarce (the holidays 
had begun), they had to walk, and then they did not go to 
the park regularly. Ethel grew less and less inclined to go 
out — except for a few minutes in the evening — and Kate 
became more and more concerned for her sister. To this 
grave anxiety was superadded an old one, which she had 
been free from since the removal to Percy Circus — how 
were the household expenses, with a doctor’s bill, now to be 
met? She suspected from the serious face with which her 


210 A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 

father would give her a few shillings when she wanted to 
buy anything for their meals that their resources were 
running low. She made an attempt to gain his confidence; 
she would like to know how much she should economise. 

“ You suppose we have very little money, eh?’' said her 
father. ‘‘ Well, we are not rolling in wealth, my dear; 
we are not Croesus — or Croesi; now which would you say, 
my dear? — but we shall get along all right with care. I 
have several pounds owing me for articles — you see they 
don’t print them so quickly as I would like— pressure on 
their space and all that — yes, two or three articles; and I 
think 1 can go on earning at the rate at least of two articles 
a week.” 

That, of course, was a fib — there was no money owing 
to him for articles, and in his secret heart there grew up 
the cold, wretched doubt, that money would never be 
owing to him for articles again — but the fib must be for- 
given him; he could not, no, not even to his daughter, con- 
fess that his high hopes of journalism seemed coming to 
naught. Where, then, did the money come from to keep 
the household going? Merrydew had managed to “ bor- 
row” five pounds of Bottiglia, while for the rent he ran 
into debt to. the kind-hearted old landlady. But borrow- 
ing on the one hand and running into debt on the other is 
so manifestly self-destructive a mode of economy, that no 
sane person could expect it to continue (though, 1 under- 
stand, many persons who cut a great figure for a season 
conduct their giddy existence on that principle.) He could 
wait no longer for a letter either from Jack Parkin or from 
George Cardigan. His daughter Ethel could surely claim 
alimony from fier husband. To make sure of alimony 
was the point to which he had been looking ever since 
Ethel’s appearance in Percy Circus, and without alimony 
he did not see how they were to live. So one day over tea 
(which was late, so that supper might be saved), he opened 
the matter to both his daughters. He felt when he had 
begun that it was a more delicate business than he had an- 
ticipated; for Ethel had said to him since her coming 
scarcely a word, good or bad, concerning her husband. 

“It will very soon be a month, my dear,” said he, 
“ since you came to us.” 

“ A month on Friday,” said Kate, looking at him and 
wondering what was to come; for she saw he was seriously 


A REVEllEND GENTLEMAN. 21 1 

occupied by his persistent stirring of his tea long after the 
sugar must have melted. 

“ And/’ continued he, “ you have not, I suppose, heard 
anything from your husband all the while?” 

“ She doesn’t want to hear from him,” said Kate, tak- 
ing her sister’s hand. 

“ We-ell,” said their father, somewhat rebuffed, I 
haven’t heard from him either. Now that is neglect 
which, I think, we should not endure;” and he gathered 
courage as his voice sounded more resolute. “ A husband 
behaves so badly that his wife has to leave him, and he 
takes no kind of notice, as if he were pleased to be rid of 
her!” 

“ Please, father,” pled Ethel, “ don’t talk about it!” 

“Eh? No, no, of course not; I’m not going to talk 
about it. 1 only want to suggest that something should 
be done. ” 

“ What do you mean, father?” said Kate, taking alarm. 
“ That Ethel should go back to him? That she should say 
she is ready to be taken back if he will promise to behave 
nicely? Never, never, father — will she say that!” 

“ My dear Kate, that must be a matter altogether for 
Ethel and her husband. But that is not — ” 

“You don’t want to go back to him — do you, dear?” in- 
terrupted Kate, appealing to her sister, who, in answer to 
the appeal, hid her face on Kate’s arm, and murmured, 
“ I don’t know! I don’t know what 1 want!” 

“Just so,” resumed their father. “But what I was 
going to suggest is, that 1 should write to your husband 
and demand alimony for you; that is,” continued he hur- 
riedly, for the eyes of both were now turned upon him in 
surprise and pain, “ a proper allowance for you to live 
upon apart from him. ” 

“ I know I am a burden to you, father!” said Ethel, 
again hiding her face, and bursting into tears on her sis- 
ter’s shoulder. “But have patience with me; I don’t 
think 1 shall be a burden long!” 

Kate was indignant with her father, and he was shocked 
he should be so misunderstood. 

“My dear child!” he exclaimed. “You mistake me 
altogether! I am not aware I have ever done anything to 
make you think 1 would not spend my last shilling with 


212 


A REVEREKD GENTLEMAN. 


my children. But still it is only right and proper that 
your husband should be made to give you alimony. 

“ Not a penny! not a farthing will she take from him!’^ 
exclaimed Kate, flashing anger, and putting her arm about 
her sister. 

“ My dear, you — you take upon you!^^ 

“ He has put dishonour enough upon her already, with- 
out that! Pm surprised, father, that you should think of 
such a thing !'^ 

“You are angry, my dear, about what you donH un- 
derstand,^’ Merrydew protested feebly. 

“If we want money, father, we can work — Ethel can’t 
at present, but 1 can for both of us. Signor Bottiglia has 
told me I could earn a great deal of money by singing at a 
music-hall.” 

“ If you were left, my dear,” sneered her father, “ to 
order your life for yourself, what with your high-flown no- 
tions and your delightful ignorance, you’d make a standing 
example for all young ladies! Why — do you know what 
singing in a music-hall means? No, of course you don’t. 
Well, Bottiglia shall take you one evening — and then you 
shall decide whether that way of earning a living is open 
to a girl like you.” 

At this point the little scene was interrupted by a loud 
“ rat-tat,” which made all three jump; it was the post- 
man’s knock. Merrydew thought it must be his long- 
expected letter from Jack Parkin or from George Cardi- 
gan. He rose and went to the door, and was just in time 
to receive from the hand of Jenny a letter addressed to 
Mrs. J. Parkin. He gave it into the trembling hand of 
Ethel. After an excited attempt to read it," she gave it 
back to her father, saying, “ I can’t make it out, father.” 
Then Merrydew read it aloud. 

“ ‘ Dear daughter-in-law ’ (“ the ‘ in-law,’ ” said he, “ is 
scored out ”) ‘ I write to tell you some news. Your husband 
has been at home here since you left him, but to-night I 
had some words with him, and he has gone away. Since 
he went I hear that a boy has come from the station for 
some of his things, and the boy has told them that he is 
waiting at the station for the train that meets the London 
train at York. Now, I think that very likely he is going 
to London to see you, and I am writing this to ask you to 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


213 


make it up with him again. For I must tell you that I 
was disappointed you had left him and gone off to your fa- 
ther in such a hurry. You might, at any rate, have come 
to me first, where you have been making your home, and 
then you might soon have heard that my son was not quite 
so much to blame as you must have thought him. He is 
a careless, thoughtless rascal, but I hope he is not a villain, 
and I think a wife should not be the first to get her hus- 
band thought so. You have married him, you know, and 
you must try to forgive his faults, and to make the best of 
your bargain. 

“ ‘ I hope to see you and Jack back again in a few days. 

“ ‘ Your loving father, 

“ ‘John Parkin.^ 

“ The old man,^^ said Merrydew, after a pause (in which 
.he folded the letter and gave it back to his daughter), “ has 
his views of a wife^s duty. There are some people who 
think that a wife should be charity personified — suffer long 
and be kind; bear all things and hope all things for her 
husband — ^be a patient Grizzle till the end of the chapter; 1 
don't think anything of the sort. Of course, my dear, if 
Jack Parkin comes to see you, you must decide for your- 
self how you will receive him — but — " he said no more, 
but shook" his head ominously. 

Ethel looked at him in thoughtful perplexity. 

“ Perhaps," said she, at length — she had kept her doubts 
back so long that they now pressed hard for utterance — 
“ perhaps 1 was mistaken in thinking all I thought; per- 
haps I judged him too — too harshly, too suddenly. I am 
sorry to have disappointed his father; I was afraid I had; 
and he was very good to me. Perhaps he is right; he is a 
very upright, true old man." 

“ Yes," admitted Merrydew; “he is a very sturdy old 
fellow." 

“ If I went back," said she, “ we might forget all about 
what has happened, and be very happy. And then 1 
shouldn't be any anxiety to you. " 

“You don't mean to go back, do you?" exclaimed 
Kate, looking rather terrible in her surprise, to live with 
him as you lived before ! How can you think of it? Where 
IS your spirit, that you can give a thought to the man?" 

Merrydew rose and sought refuge from anxious thoughts 


214 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


and warm words in the contemplation of the dusty foliage 
and the parched grass in the round enclosure in the middle 
of the Circus. 

“ Don’t be impatient with me, Kate,” said Ethel, put- 
ting her arm about her sister’s neck, and her head on her 
breast. “ You do not know, my proud, strong dear! Oh, 
no, you do not! You do not know what pain it is! 
How torn 1 feel! I have no life of my own! I seem to 
have given it away! And I must go where it is, or die!” 

“ 1 think, my dears,” said Merrydew, turning and utter- 
ing a sudden thought (he had not heard what Ethel had 
been saying), “ I think we may very well postpone your 
discussion till we see if Mr. Jack really does turn up.” 

So he sat down to his little writing-table by one of the 
windows, while his daughters went out to find what fresh 
air there might be hanging about the trees of Claremont 
Square. But he could not apply himself to the composi- 
tion of the article he was attempting on the pleasures of 
summer in London; his attention would become fugitive 
and would return, after a short fiight here and there, to 
the anxious question of cash. How? — how were he and his 
daughters going to live? 1 am afraid it is true that he 
then felt considerable disappointment that there was a pos- 
sibility of a reconciliation between Ethel and her husband. 
If there were no reconciliation, he saw a clear prospect of 
two or three hundred a year, which income, though it 
would be Ethel’s, would make him feel that his own exist- 
ence would not be a burden to him. 

He laid his pen down, and went out to buy the evening 
paper— his paper, the “ P. M. G.;” for he steadily main- 
tained the fiction that he was a frequent contributor, and, 
lest that should be doubted, would point to an article of 
whose subject he knew something as the offspring of his 
own laborious pen. 

He walked over to the Great Northern Station at King’s 
Cross to buy his paper at the stall of the First Lord of the 
Treasury, and then, seeking something more to interest 
him, he sauntered up the arrival platform, where he saw a 
train was being expected. The train steamed into the sta- 
tion, but there was no great bustle; it was the season rather 
for leaving London than for coming to it. Among pas- 
sengers with an obsequious porter in attendance one at 
once attracted his eye; there was no mistaking the dark. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


215 


somewhat saturnine face and the handsome figure : it was 
Jack Parkin. After the first dash of surprise, he was about 
to step up to greet him, when he observed there was a 
young lady in his company, a fine girl, tall and dark, but 
with a look of dejection, Merrydew thought. They got 
into a cab, on the roof of which was a goodly pile of lug- 
gage. Should he follow them, and discover where they 
went? With bitterness he refiected he could not afiord 
cab-hire; he had not more than five or six shillings in the 
world. 

As he returned to Percy Circus, a man stopped him, and 
begged a match to light his pipe. Merrydew granted this 
small alms, and as he went his way said to himself, “ The 
conventions of society are very arbitrary ! That man did 
not hesitate to ask me for a light, and, since I had it, I 
conldn'’t but give it him. How many men there are here 
in London to whom a bank-note is comparatively of no 
more value than a pipe-light is to me! If I went up to 
one and said, ‘ I happen to have no money, would you 
oblige me with ten pounds?' why shouldn't he give it me 
as readily as I gave that man a match?" 


CHAPTEE XXXIV. 

ALIMONY. 

Next evening but one George Cardigan called, and 
Merrydew soon learned that his appearance was connected 
with the arrival he had witnessed at King's Cross. When 
his name was announced Ethel escaped to her room. 

“ You have just returned from your holiday, 1 suppose," 
Merrydew made haste to say. 

“ Yes," said George, solemnly. 

“Enjoyed it pretty well?" asked Merrydew, lightly. 
“ Been shooting a good deal, I daresay?" 

“ No," said George, glancing at Kate, “ not at all." 

“ Still you've taken a long holiday-long for a busy 
young barrister. " 

“ Hang it, sir!" cried George, almost in tears. “ Don t 
chaff! I'm in awful trouble! and I believe I've helped to 
make it as bad as it is!" 

“ Oh, I'm so sorry," said Kate. “ What is it?" 

“ I don't know," said George, “ that it's right to tell 
you," 


216 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


“ You’d better say on/’ said Merrydew, rather snappish- 
ly; “ tell us both, now you’ve mentioned it. Something 
about Mr. Jack Parkin, I suppose?” 

“ Yes. Three days ago he left Sherborne with my sis- 
ter. I know they were together, because a porter saw 
them meet, and I traced them to York, where — where 
they stayed all night.” 

Kate rose hurriedly, and went into the next room to her 
sister; for she feared Ethel might have overheard George 
Cardigan’s disclosure. 

“ Where they went to from York I don’t know,” con- 
tinued George, “ though I suspect they have come to Lon- 
don.” 

“ They have,” said Merrydew, promptly. “ I saw them 
arrive at King’s Cross the night before last.” 

“ You did? Oh, thank you,” said George. “ Then 1 
shall soon find him. Where did they go? Didn’t you fol- 
low them?” 

“ Unfortunately,” said Merrydew, frankly, “ 1 couldn’t. 
I’m so doosid hard up. But it won’t be difficult, I should 
think, to find them, if you want to. Still, you needn’t be- 
gin your pursuit at once. Tell me how it came about; you 
said you were to blame somehow for it.” 

Then George told his story; he did not tell it very well, 
as may be guessed. In sum it came to this: From Lon- 
don he had gone straight to Scarborough, and had seen his 
sister with Mrs. Wantock. He had said plainly what he 
had come ^bout, upon which his sister had been offended 
and indignant, and Mrs. Wantock — “ the old witch ” — had 
laughed at him, and asked him if he had never seen any slip- 
pers at a bedside but his own. Then he had gone home. 
More than a fortnight passed, during which he watched Mr. 
Jack Parkin’s movements very closely; Parkin was then 
at home. He saw nothing till he followed him one day to 
Scarborough and entered Mrs. Wantock’s after him. 
Thereupon his sister had accused him of spying upon her. 
He returned home, angry, and told his parents the whole 
story, and the suspicion that seemed justified. At once 
they summoned their daughter home. “ Then/’ said 
George, “ there was a row, and I said things, I believe, 
that a man should never say to a woman — even if the 
woman be only his sister. I was in a rage. I went straight 
to the Hall to go for Jack Parkin. I met him and his fa- 


A REVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


217 


ther together. I spoke right up to the old man, and — 
would you believe it? — Jack had come over him and got 
him to think his wife — your daughter — had been mistaken, 
and had left him for nothing. But when 1 told him what 
1 knew, you should have seen him, poor old chap! I was 
sorry for him. ‘ You come with me, my lad!’ said he to 
Jack, and they went into the house. 1 suppose they had 
a row. The next I knew was that Jack Parkin and my 
sister were seen at the station.” 

“ So,” said Merrydew, “^ou think you had a considera- 
ble hand in sending them off together. And I’ve no doubt 
you had, my son. ” 

George was in a fidget to be off on his search for the 
errant pair. He seemed scarcely pleased that Merrydew 
took his story so easily; he could not, of course, guess that 
from the parson’s present point of view things could not 
have turned out better than they did. However, it was 
some satisfaction to him that Merrydew begged him to send 
Jack Parkin’s address as soon as he learned it. 

“You really want it?” asked George. 

“ That I do — 1 promise you,” said Merrydew, with a 
minatory shake of the head. 

But we know that it was for no vengeful lethal purpose 
the parson desired the address of his daughter’s fugitive 
husband. He was entirely in accord with modern law- 
abiding sentiment in seeking to take, not the sinner’s life, 
but the sinner’s money. 

Probably, if he had gone to an honest solicitor he might 
have had the fingering of alimony for his daughter in the 
very short space of time that is vulgarly known as less 
than none. But he feared expense, he shrank from any- 
thing that savoured of publicity, and, above all, he had 
made up his mind that his daughters should not know what 
he was about — at any rate, until the business was accom- 
plished. So he waited for Jack Parkin’s address— to ob- 
tain which he made two or three ineffectual attempts him- 
self. 

Thus several weeks passed, in which Merrydew and his 
daughters touched a lower deep of poverty than they had 
ever before experienced, or ever would experience again. 
But I must not linger on that. Most people do not like 
to read descriptions of respectable poverty, or of such shifts 


218 


A EEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


of bareness as they may chance to be reduced to (though, 
Heaven forbid that any of my readers may!) before they 
have done with this work-a-day world. But, just as, I be- 
lieve, there is no depth of the ocean to which some light is 
not reflected or refracted, so there is no depth of misery 
but has its gleams of hope, of kindness, of cheerfulness, of 
happiness even. At that time of penury and patience, to 
get from some honest bookseller the unexpected, magnifi- 
cent sum of twenty shillings for a few old books filled 
Merrydew for a day or two with delight, and with a sense 
of boundless wealth. And never were people kinder to the 
lodger within their gates than was the landlady of the 
house and her family. The orgies of bread and cheese and 
beer, with talk and laughter, in the kitchen, to which the 
Merrydews were invited again and again, which Merrydew 
and sometimes Kate attended, were for ever memorable. 
Then it was that Bottiglia broached the wildest revolution 
with an Italian fervour which his ordinary existence would 
scarcely suggest that he possessed. Then, too, he an- 
nounced publicly his conviction that the musical and his- 
trionic talents which he saw “ plain, very plain,’' Miss 
Merrydew possessed should not be shut up in 10 Percy Cir- 
cus, but should be “ for the delight of London;” and one 
evening he declared he was “ autorise ” to say that if Miss 
Merrydew liked she might have a part — a very small part, 
but still a “ part ” — in the melodrama which his com- 
patriots were about to produce at the Academy Theatre 
(the music-hall suggestion had, of course, been negatived). 
The opportunity really proved a considerable one; should 
Kate acquit herself well, it might be the opening of a 
career for her; the part, at first, was a mute part, but 
when it was found that she could sing well while a certain 
actress for whom a song was set down could only sing in- 
differently, the song was transferred to her. 

Thus, to look back upon that season seemed one of the 
pleasantest and sprightliest, though to experience it had 
appeared the cruelest and most anxious that a malign Fate 
had ever sent. The anxiety of the time which overshad- 
owed them more and more was the condition of Ethel’s 
health. From the day of George Cardigan’s appearance 
she visibly passed into the lowest plight of hopelessness 
and woe. Poor girl! what were her wretched thoughts it 
seems cruel even to guess. The beautiful hopes, the pure. 


A KEVEREIsD GENTLEMAK. 


219 


unselfish purposes of her life, which she had nursed and 
tended as a true woman, a loving and helpful wife, always 
will, were blighted and broken. Her house was left to her 
desolate! What, then, could she do, since she was not of 
a rebellious, resolute spirit but bow her head and suffer? 

“Father dear,” said Kate, “Ethel gets worse and 
worse. When I wake up in the night 1 find her almost 
always crying, and when 1 ask her ‘ What’s the matter?^ 
she says ‘Nothing.^ And you know she won’t eat. If 
we could only afford to get her some tempting little things 
and a bottle or two of nice wine. Yes; Signor Bottiglia is 
very good; but she does not like the Italian wine. Women 
take fancies, of course, when they are like her. But 1 was 
going to say — don’t you think we should call in a good 
doctor to advise us what to do to set her up a little? Per- 
haps we can afford it; I shall get my first week’s salary, 
you know, for rehearsal at the Academy to-morrow.” 

“ Of course,” said her father, “ we must afford to call 
a doctor in, my dear, though for all his advice can do I 
think 1 could advise myself; but still we must get him.” 

It was easy enough to summon a “ good ” doctor — but 
to pay him? Kate, of course, still supposed that her fa- 
ther was earning some money by his literary assiduities, 
though lie was paid with shameful irregularity and pain- 
ful meanness. What was the unfortunate father to do? 
Though he felt it hard upon him that Ethel should permit 
herself to sink into so inert a condition, yet he tenderly 
pitied her; he was her father, and when he recalled how 
sweet and full of life she had been only a few months ago, 
he felt as uncompromisingly angry with her husband as it 
was possible for him to be. Jack Parkin must know he 
had little money, and must know, too, his wife’s situation. 
Was it not intolerable that she should be in need of little 
comforts and luxuries and a doctor’s advice at such a time? 
that she should be neglected even of his rough old father, 
who had seemed to be fond of her? As he agitated these 
matters in his mind, he resolved that he would at once 
override the squeamish objections of both his daughters 
to touch the Parkin money, and since it seemed Jack Par- 
kin’s London address was not to be gained, he would write 
to him to Sherborne; if the letter were forwarded to him, 
well and good; if the old man opened it and kept it, still 
well and good. 


220 


A RKVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


So to Jack Parkin he wrote, and addressed the letter to 
“ Sherborne Hall. 

On the fourth day after there came a letter addressed in 
a formal, large, business hand, which Merrydew could not 
recognise as that of either the younger or the elder Parkin. 
It was from Slee, Slee & Sou, Solicitors, of Basinghall 
Street, City, who begged to inform Mr. Merrydew that 
they were instructed by Mr. John Parkin to pay as alimony 
to Mrs. John Parkin the sum of two hundred pounds per 
annum in monthly instalments, to be increased to three 
hundred pounds per annum in the event of Mrs. John 
Parkin having a child, such child to pass, as is usual in 
such circumstances, into the care of the father, or of such 
guardian as the father may appoint, if the mother should 
die before the child was of proper age. Mr. Merrydew was 
requested to communicate to Slee, Slee & Son, where it 
would be convenient to Mrs. John Parkin that the alimony 
should be paid. 

Merrydew was so overcome with delight at this sudden 
burst of the sunshine of fortune, that he, very imprudent- 
ly, called his daughters to rejoice with him. Perhaps that 
was scarcely to be avoided, since they were in the room 
when the letter arrived, and since, it is presumed, they had 
their eyes on him while he read it. 

“ Listen to this, girls,^^ he cried, beamiiig upon them. 
He re-read the communication of Slee, Slee & Son, and ex- 
claimed, “ Now, Ethel, my dear, we can afford to get you 
whatever you like. Perhaps, the best thing to do first will 
be to take you to the seaside somewhere — to Hastings or 
Brighton.'^ 

“ The seaside!’^ said she, with a shudder. “ 1 never 
want to go to the seaside again. 

Kate looked straight before her in frigid silence. Merry- 
dew had an uneasy sense of her disapproval. 

“ Well, my dear,'^ he said, feeling compelled to appeal 
to her, “ what do you think of it?^" 

“ Did you write to ask for the money, father?"" she in- 
quired, turning her clear eyes on him. 

“ My dear,"" he said, somewhat disconcerted by her 
look, and at the same time rather angry, “ your question- 
ing is offensive. It"s a new thing for me, begad! to be 
my daughter"s catechumen! Where did you ever hear of 
a wife, even when she is— is apart from her husband, not 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN-. 


221 


receiving proper maintenance, especially when her husband 
can well afford it? It is always done; the — the law com- 
pels it. One does not need to appear as a beggar to ask 
for it!^^ 

“ I would not/^ exclaimed Kate, indignant and obsti- 
nate, “ touch the money of such a man! And Ethel, I’m 
sure, would say the same if she cared to speak out all she 
feels about it!” 

‘‘It is, of course, for Ethel,” said he, glancing at her 
anxiously, while he put the letter in his pocket — “ for Ethel 
to decide whether the offer is to be accepted or no. She 
knows what I think about it. It is her right; and it would 
be a piece of foolish, squeamish sentiment to refuse it — a 
sentiment which we could afford to indulge if we were so 
well off as not to miss the alimony offered.” 

“ I would rather pinch on bread-and-scrape!” said Kate. 
“ I would rather starve than take his money!” 

“ My dear, you have never tried starving; consequently, 
you have a most preposterous idea of what you might do in 
such a condition! What does Ethel say?” 

“ Oh,” said she, “ I don’t know quite what to say, fa- 
ther. I’d much rather we could do without it; but I know 
I am a great expense to you, and — ” 

“ You’re not! you’re not, my dear!” cried Kate, sud- 
denly catching her sister to her breast, and beginning to 
shed tears over her. “ You’re scarcely any expense at all! 
You shall not be put to shame and disgrace by taking his 
money! Let him spend it where he spends the rest! I 
can keep us both, my dear, till you are well enough, at 
any rate, to do something yourself!” 

“There you are again, Kate!” exclaimed her father. 
“ As if I begrudged Ethel’s charges! I can never get you 
to take a proper, rational view of things!” 

“ Please don’t try father. Perhaps as I grow older I 
shall grow wise and worldly like you.^’ Having said that, 
she softened, and, holding her sister’s hand, came to her 
father. “ Please, daddy, forgive me. You are right no 
doubt. But you don’t know how Ethel and I feel about 
this; we’ve talked about it often, and we’d rather anything 
than have money from him. Please listen, daddy; be kind 
to us in this. I know you are anxious, you poor old dear, 
about money matters. But we should not prosper — I feel 
we should not — if we took that money; tell them, then. 


222 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


please, that we don^t want it, and you shall see how well 
we can get along without it. 1 shall do so well at the 
Academy that I shall get my salary raised and raised, and 
I shall have enough to keep us all, and you neediiH worry. 
Oh, father, let us live happy together without being 
ashamed!’’ And she put her arms about his neck, and 
v/ept on his breast. 

Her loving appeal and her tearful loveliness would have 
melted a heart of stone, let alone a heart so accessible to 
feeling and beauty as her father’s; her suggestion, too, 
that ill-fortune might attend the acceptance of such money 
was a shrewd touch; for Merrydew, like all men who have 
had ups and downs in life, was a good deal influenced by 
superstition. 

“ Very well, my dear,” he murmured, while a tear ob- 
truded itself in the corner of his own eye. “ There, my 
child, there. We will decline the offer, then. Yes; and I 
daresay we shall manage. ‘ We have always been pro- 
vided for,’ as the song says, ‘ and so will we yet.’ I — I — 
have no doubt.” 

And for the time he assumed the reckless, swaggering, 
unfortunate belief that the kingdom of this world is to be 
taken by storm — a belief which in his ordinary mood he 
would have been the first to pour contempt upon. But 
his exalted mood did not last far into the evening; it sank 
lower and lower upon him, and at length he emerged from 
it, resolved to call in the morning on Slee, Slee & Son, and 
hear what they had to say. 

About eleven o’clock next day (Merrydew thought that 
a good business hour) he entered the office of Slee, Slee 
& Son, in Basinghall Street. He sent in his card with 
“ Reverend William Merrydew, M. A.,” engraved upon it, 
and when seated in the inner parlour near a bald-headed, 
but genial-looking old Slee, he produced the letter which 
he had received from the firm the afternoon before. 

“ And you have come to arrange about this, Mr. Merry- 
dew?” asked Slee. 

“ Ye-es,” said Merrydew. 

“ Mrs. John Parkin, I believe, is your daughter; is she 
with you?” 

“ Well, no,” said Merrydew. “ The fact is she is not 
well enough to come out, aud I thought — ” 

“ Oh, it doesn’t matter,” said Slee, looking at Merry- 


A REYEKEKD GENTLEMAN. 


223 


dew and at his card. “ I understand. She is your daugh- 
ter, and she lives with you, I presume, as things are at 
present?^ ^ 

“ Yes,^^ said Merrydew. Then with a great effort — 
“ Will you want to see her personally before putting this 
arrangement in force 

Slee stroked his chin, and looked at the parson and at 
the parson^s card — that of a respectable reverend gentle- 
man — and he said, “No; I think not, sir. But we shall 
want her receipt for every payment. 

“ Very well; of course,^' said Merrydew. 

And forthwith he received the first monthly instalment 
of his daughter’s alimony — a cheque for sixteen pounds 
thirteen shillings and fourpence — along with a filled-in 
form of receipt to be signed by his daughter. The cheque 
he took at once to the bank and cashed, and once again 
felt himself a man of considerable, if precarious, substance. 

But the signature to the receipt — how was that to be ob- 
tained? He fidgetted about Ethel all the evening, having 
half a mind now to tell her what he had done, and now to 
obtain her signature on some other pretence. But he be- 
thought him at length that Slee, Slee & Son could not 
know her handwriting, so he ended the matter by signing 
with his own hand “ Ethel Parkin. 


CHAPTER XXXV. 

ATROPOS. 

The Reverend AVilliam Merrydew had committed a 
criminal action, it is evident; but that direct fact troubled 
him less — as, 1 fear, it troubles everybody who is tempted 
to behave criminally — than the merely relative issue of hav- 
ing his crime found out. So he resolved, in case anything 
disagreeable should happen, to have an extenuating plea 
ready, he would spend the whole of the alimony (or almost 
the whole of it) to benefit his daughter — to save her health, 
perhaps to preserve her chid — in spite of herself; he would 
even keep an account of his expenditure. 

1 believe that for the first week or two he remembered 
with uneasiness Kate’s prediction that the alimony, if ac- 
cepted, would prove a curse; but it approved itself as 
valuable as any other money, as capable of purchasing 
things vendible, and his uneasiness died away. But there 


224 


A EEVEEENB GENTLEMAN. 


appeared two or three drawbacks to the enjoyment of it. 
In the first place, the only way of accounting for the pos- 
session and the prospect of so much money was to lead it 
to be supposed that he did a good deal of well-paid jour- 
nalism, a fiction which made it necessary that he should sit 
closer to his desk and appear busier than was sometimes 
agreeable, and which brought down, too, upon his blush- 
ing head the exulting commendation of Kate: “ AVhat did 
I say, father? Didn't 1 tell you that we should get on ever 
so much better if we refused that money?" Another draw- 
back to satisfaction was the fact that the money had a de- 
plorably weak tendency — in part, no doubt, due to its ille- 
gitimate origin — to dissipate itself on things frivolous, 
things, moreover, which were not intended for Ethel’s 
benefit, in spite of the resolution that all (that is, nearly 
all) the alimony should be devoted to that end, and kept 
account of in proper form. 

“ Do you find, Bottiglia," Merrydew said one day to his 
friend, “ that writing down an account of your expenditure 
keeps it low?’’ 

“ My accounts?’’ exclaimed Bottiglia. “I write my 
accounts in my ’ead, and — yes, sometime — on the back of 
an envelope, who go and lose itself. ’’ ' 

“ Ah,’’ said Merrydew, “ you are as bad as me. 1 keep 
my accounts in my head till I seem to be doing nothing 
but working an eternal small sum in reduction, like a 
school-boy, begad. Pound after pound melts and dribbles 
away God knows how or where. I must really keep a 
diary.’’ 

But no chronicling of expenditure, however careful, could 
keep the account quite as Merrydew had at first resolved it 
should be. “ Self— so much ’’ could no more be kept out 
of the pages of the parson’s cash diary than could King 
Charles’s Head be kept out of Mr. Dick’s Memorial. How 
was it possible? — since the alimony was the only money 
which Merrydew’s pocket contained. “Self,’’ indeed, 
had to be writtten so often that he grew ashamed of it, and 
being in his way a simple, honest fellow, and not caring to 
cook his accounts, and at the same time thinking that the 
day of recko' ng for his stewardship was probably as dis- 
tant as the Greek Kalends, he shut up his cash diary alto- 
gether. 


A REVEREKD GENTLEMAK. 


225 


So the month passed, the “ sixteen-thirteen-four was 
all spent, and the second instalment was almost due. 
Merrydew waited in some trepidation, apprehensive of a 
difficulty about its payment. But it came quite unosten- 
tatiously and confidingly by post from Slee, Slee & Son, 
accompanied by a form of receipt, which, with extreme 
nervousness, Merrydew signed “ Ethel Parkin.'’^ 

That had like to have been the last of the alimony. 
Ethel, whose health had been sinking lower and lower, 
took to her bed early in that murky, filthy November. 
That was not regarded as so serious a matter, because it 
would in any case have been inevitable in a week or two, 
and because it was reckoned that when once she was a 
mother she would experience a new desire for life and 
strength. At length the anxious hour came when a new 
— a very new — little lodger breathed the air of 10 Percy 
Circus, and a weak wailing cry was heard, which made all 
the expectant women murmur “ Bless it!^^ and wipe their 
eyes. The parson was now pushed from his stool as the 
most interesting person in the house, and his place was 
taken by his grand-daughter, with her sounds of puling 
woe. But he did not heed that — nor the scant regard 
which Kate gave now to his wants, to his likes and dislikes 
at table — for he was occupied and elated with the prospect 
of having the next instalment of alimony increased at the 
rate of a hundred pounds a year. He must announce, 
somehow, to the Parkins that there was a child born to in- 
herit their name, though not to perpetuate it. The utmost 
he could do was to publish the fact in the newspapers, and 
write to Slee, Slee & Son. He wrote, also to Parkin senior, 
who replied in a very short, and very precise note (the chief 
sentence of which was, “ It should have been a boy he 
inclosed, however, a cheque for twenty pounds to buy “ a 
cradle and a rattle.^-’ 

Thus the child came, and much rousing excitement came 
with it, and there came, also, the due maternal love to 
!1 utter EthePs heart, and to renew her hold on life. For 
some time all went prosperously and hopefully; in the doc- 
tore's phrase, mother and child were doing well — “ as well 
as could be expected ’’ — and the delighted grandfather was 
planning Christmas at Brighton for them while he looked 
on at the cleverness with which Aunt Kate handled, and 
tended, and soothed the baby. But on a certain morning 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


m 

tha mother was restless and feverish; and the doctor, when 
he called, pulled a serious face. 

“ Why — what is this?’' said he, turning to Kate. “ She 
has been catching cold.” 

“ I don't know how that can be, doctor,'' said Kate. 

The patient was closely questioned, and then it came out 
that on the evening before she had left her bed for a min- 
ute or two to go to the cradle, while Kate was absent on 
duty at the theatre and the nurse was downstairs. 

That was the beginning of the end. The poor young 
mother, just plucking up hope and courage for a new 
epoch of life, was prostrate under what doctors, 1 believe, 
call puerperal fever. She did not “ rally her strength,” 
as Dr. Ayling expressed a hope that she might, since she 
was a young and healthy woman, not because she declined 
“ to make an effort,” but because she had no strength to 
rally; it had been spent in those weeks of brooding and 
fretting before she took to her bed.. 

Kate exerted herself to the utmost for her sister's recov- 
ery; she even gave up her promising little engagement at 
the theatre (with her father's sanction), in order that she 
might devote herself without interruption to nursing her; 
and her father seemed well-nigh mad with grief and ap- 
prehension. Never before had he appeared to such ad- 
vantage as a parent. He brought home great bunches of 
the most expensive and luscious grapes, which the poor 
patient could not touch; he hung anxiously about her bed- 
side; he urged the doctor to spare no trouble nor expense 
for her restoration. 

“We must save her, Kate, my dear!” he exclaimed, 
with genuine fervor. “ It will never do to let her die.” 

“We will save her, daddy dear!” said she, embracing 
him, and thinking what a dear, anxious father he was. 
“ Ai]d if anything will help her to get better, it will be — 
apart from baby, to know that you love her so much!” 

Had Merrydew any consciousness of playing the hypocrite 
over this? I do not think he had. The factitious value 
which his daughter had recently assumed in his eyes did 
not take the place of, but only cunningly heightened that 
natural affection for her which he was not without. It was 
of so much consequence that she should live, what wonder 
was it? — what harm was it? — that he should be supremely 
anxious, and manifest his anxiety, for her recovery. Do 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


227 


not even the most simple, honest, and devoted wives and 
mothers do the same when the death of the husband and fa- 
ther is imminent? My neighbor Jones lies dying; I go in 
to help him to sustain the last pangs of life, and find Mrs. 
Jones plunged in an agony of grief, and I respect her emo- 
tion as natural, and proper, and honorable — though if I 
begin curiously to analyse it into its elements, 1 shall find 
that a considerable quantity of her tears are shed for her- 
self— for the cold life of poverty and widowhood that lies 
before her. Do I therefore smile in scorn of poor Mrs. 
Jones? Not at all. AVe are all mortal; and even the most 
beautiful of our actions spring out of impulses and motives 
which we had better not too curiously examine. 

Merrydew hoped against hope that his daughter might 
recover her strength; he watched by her bedside often in 
the night, and moved haggard about the house by day; he 
touched the honest Bottiglia to tears by his mention of his 
“ poor, dear girl; che is,^^ said he, “ really breaking her 
heart for that scoundrel who has deserted her!’^ and he won 
the affection of all the women in the house, who were sure 
he was the kindest of fathers, and the best of men. 

“ If I was the queen, said the old landlady, “ I would 
make him a bishop — that I would !’^ 

At length the doctor wished to speak to Mr. Merrydew 
by himself. He told him that in all probability Mrs. Par- 
kin would not last out the twenty-four hours. 

“ And,^^ said he, “ you are a clergyman, Mr. Merrydew, 
and will understand how to prepare your daughter for 
what is before her.’' 

The Eeverend Mr. Merrydew had not a word to say; ho 
turned his head, and Hr. Ayling wrung his hand and de- 
parted. At that moment he hated the doctor; he felt as if 
he had found him out in something nefarious — all because 
he had reminded him of the clerical function which he had 
years ago it seemed laid aside. To think of dying or of 
death made him shiver; how then w'as he to speak to his 
daughter on such a matter? In the few minutes that 
passed before he reached the death-bed he felt himself for 
the first time since he was a very young man and suscepti- 
ble to religious influences a miserable sinner; he had led a 
foolish and unworthy life. Ah, well! 

When he stood and looked at his daughter, so thin now 
and helpless, but lately so fair and full of life, he had a 


328 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


sudden vision of the futility of everything. He tried hard 
as lie bent over her to drag himself up to the necessity 
which the doctor had set before him, but he could not; he 
turned away. There are certain trains of ideas which leave 
prints of themselves about our eyes and mouth. Ethel 
had been observing her father, and, with the acuteness of 
perception common at such a crisis, she saw what was the 
matter. 

“ Father, said she, in her weak voice, “ you want to 
say something; the doctor has told you I am going to die.'’^ 

“ My dear! my dear!’' exclaimed he, returning to her. 

“ I know I am, daddy. But,” added she, wistfully, “ I 
can’t help it! Dear father, let me say what I have to say 
while I am able. I must confess this, dear,” said she, 
drawing down his head towards her; “ I did want to die 
not very long ago. I thought I was a burden to you, that 
you didn’t love me at all, any more than Jack did. For- 
give me, dear! But you have been very, very good to me, 
father, and I was silly to think you were not! Kiss me, 
dear.” 

He kissed her. He closed his eyes and hid his face on 
the pillow beside her. He was almost resolved to tell her 
all, how unworthy he was of her regard, how meanly he 
had won it. If he had told her, my story would have 
ended here, and, for the matter of that, being then an ordi- 
nary story enough, it would probably not have been written 
at all. But the opportunity passed and did not return. 

“ Ethel darling,” said Kate, striving to choke back her 
grief, “ 1 think you must be quiet now. We must not let 
you lose a chance.” 

“ I’d better say, dear,” she continued, “ what I’ve been 
thinking of. Will you raise my head a little? Kate,” said 
she, giving her disengaged hand to her sister, who knelt 
impulsively down and kissed it, ” I want you to promise 
me something. My baby— don’t let her father have her 
when I am gone! I feel sure,” she went on hurriedly, 
without looking at Kate, “ that he will marry that woman 
when — when he knows he may, and she must not, Kate — 
she must not have my baby! Keep my baby always, Kate 
dear — won’t you? — and be her mother in my place! You’ll 
be a better mother than me, dear. ” 

“ Don’t, darling! — don’t!” pled Kate, in anguish. 


A REVEREND GENi'LEMAir. 229 

“ Yon will promise me? I know you will love her, and 
tell her, dear —tell her some day about me/^ 

“ Yes, dear,’^ said Kate, with fervour; ‘‘I promise — I 
p omise. She shall always stay with me, and 1 will be her 
mother as miK.-h as I can!^’ 

“ z\nd daddy,’’ concluded Ethel, raising her eyes to her 
father with a wan, sweet smile, that seemed already that 
of another, a serener life — “daddy will be her father and 
grandfather in one. You will both have another Ethel to 
love.” 

The sisters kissed each other, and their father stood by a 
witness of the silent compact. 

Thu early dusk was closing in cold and thick, but they 
were afraid to leave her to get a light. For some minutes 
no sound was heard but the faint crackling of the fire in 
the grate, and the rapid ticking of the clock in the siiting- 
room. 

“ Say something to me, father,” Ethel murmured at 
length. “ Pray, father.” 

He knelt down by the bed, and repeated such appropri- 
ate petitions as he could remember from “ The Visitation 
of the Sick,” doubting the while their efficacy, and op- 
pressed with a sense that the words were lost in the air of 
the room. 

“ Give me my baby,” she said, after another pause. 

Kate went to bring the baby from the cradle. 

“ Kate,” cried her father, in a tone which struck cold 
terror to her heart, “ bring a light!” 

The light and tlie baby were brought together; and, as 
they appt'ared, the breath of life went out of Ethel Parkin, 
leaving a sweet smile for memory to invest her with till the 
end. 

:i; * * * * 

Poor girl! hers was surely a sad and exasperating fate! 
AVhere, now, were the innocent hopes, the abounding love 
she had brought wrapt in sweet womanly simplicity and 
generosity, and laid at the feet of the young man she loved? 
Broken, Idas!— broken, and shed like precious spikenard 
against (he ugly, rough banalities of a world she did not 
understand, and from which she shrank away in fear. 

And her father— the man who was perhaps more respon- 
sible than any for (his wreck of life, and love, and hope— 
what of him? Let us leave him in pity, where he kneels 


230 


A KEVEREND GE^'TLEMAN. 


by Iiis dead daughter, while sobs, to which his breast is all 
urmsued, break from him. The staff on which he has be- 
gun to lean with so much confidence has slipped under 
him, and he is prostrate and bewildered. 


CHAPTER XXX VI. 

THE WAY OF TRANSGRESSORS. 

It is necessary for us to return for a little to Mr. Jack 
Parkin, in order that ive may properly understand the ex- 
traordinary development of the Merrydew story which is 
about to ensue. 

We have already heard reported as much of his move- 
ments as it is necessary to know, from the time his wife 
fled from him until he fled to London with Miss Cardigan, 
lie drove from King’s Cross that evening, when Merrydew 
so unexpectedly set eyes on him, to one of those quiet, ex- 
pensive little hotels in St. James’s, and engaged rooms 
for “ Captain and Mrs. Parkin.” You see the young man 
conceived life on a very extravagant scale for the son of an 
old Bradford weaver, and the recipient of an allowance of 
five hundred pounds a year. He had before leaving Cam- 
bridge been introduced by some of his friends to a club of 
the proprietary sort, where the odds on all events were 
freely taken, and where gambling was the serious occupa- 
tion of the small hours of the morning. This place he 
began to frequent with more and more regularity as 
Eleanor Cardigan’s company became more and more weari- 
some to him. They breakfasted lightly and late in their 
room, when he left Eleanor to her two hours’ toilet and 
went to his club, where he again breakfasted,” because 
he thought it “ proper form.” He was a young man yet, 
and bowed with the utmost respect to what he considered 
the usages of good society. At the club he would probably 
spend the afternoon, returning to Eleanor to take her to 
dine at some restaurant, and thence to the theatre; for 
these pleasures were still pretty fresh to both of them. 
After that, for him, the club again; for her, impatient 
counting of the half hours and hours till his return. 

This ruinous, fevered, and gaslit existence had not lasted 
many weeks, when he called for his quarter’s allowance at 
the bank which took charge of his father’s metropolitan 
business. There he was astonished by the information that 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


231 


his allovvanoe, until further notice, was to be at the rate of 
only three hundred pounds a year, and for the explanation 
he demanded he was referred to Slee, Slee & Son. Thither 
he at once hurried, and learned for the first time that two 
of his five hundred had been diverted by his father to his 
wife, and that when (or if) a child was born, three hundred 
instead of two would be thus diverted. He was, of course, 
highly indignant with this confiscation; not that he be- 
grudged his alienated wife sufficient to live upon, but that 
he did not see the necessity of cutting off his own supplies 
in order to feed her. He could not but feel that his 
straightforward old father had arranged this not from par- 
simony, but from a stern, though restrained sense of the 
justice which we call “ poetical — and that stung him 
more. He wrote to his father (“ he had the impudence to 
write!” a sympathetic parent will sa.y), complaining of so 
serious an abridgement of his allowance. His father re- 
plied at once that he did not wish to hold any further com- 
munication with him, and that if he did not like the 
“shortened allowance,” he could leave it alone, and set 
about earning his living. 

Then was “ Captain ” Parkin made to think very serious- 
ly about his future. He was not the kind of young man 
that can live utterly regardless of the morrow. His re- 
duced income was scarcely enough to buy cigars for him- 
self, and gloves for Miss Cardigan; and Miss Cardigan her- 
self had no income, nor expectation now of income, for 
Mrs. Wantock had repudiated her. What, then, was to be 
done? Captain Parkin determined to take his companion 
into his confidence — a resolution which he had occasion to 
carry into effect as soon as formed. 

“Jack dear,” she said to him, “don't you think 1 
should have a maid, living as we do here?” 

Then he told her (not with the best temper when he 
began) that not only must a maid be dispensed with, but 
also some other things which might be deemed more neces- 
sin-y — as, for instance, clothes to wear and dinners to eat. 
He told her how his allowance had been reduced, and how 
in a little while it would probably be reduced still more. 
He had prepared himself to see his communication received 
with silence and sulkiness, for Miss Cardigan had of late 
1) . eii somewhat morose, when she was not hysterically tear- 
ful. The result agreeably surprised him. She looked at 


232 


A KEVEIIEND GE^iTLEMAls. 


him a moment with open, thoughtful eyes, and then she 
rose and came to him. 

“ I suppose,'' said she, “ that is very little to live upon. 
I had no idea. Jack — I never somehow thought but you 
had as much money as you liked. And it's me that has 
brought you to this! You wouldn't have left home if it 
had not been for me! I am very, very sorry, my dear! 1 
seem to have brought you nothing but trouble and poverty. 
I am afraid," she said, sadly, “you must hate me some- 
times for it all. But don’t leave me. Jack! You won't 
leave me! I know now how we are, and perhaps 1 shall be 
able to help you." 

Then they sat down together to a serious discussion of 
their prospects. They agreed that the first thing to do 
was to leave the hotel and enter lodgings. Eleanor won- 
dered whether Jack might not now try to fulfil his old am- 
bition for a military career, but he smiled at that, and said 
such an ambition was now more hopeless than ever. 

" And I’ve made it hopeless!" she exclaimed. “ I see I 
have! Forgive me. Jack." 

They removed into rooms in Cork Street, for Captain 
Parkin could not bring himself to go farther afield than 
that in search of economy. The rent to be paid was very 
much out of proportion to their income, but it did not 
seem to Mr. Jack that any place fit to be lived in could be 
had for less, and they must live, whether the cost of living 
was covered or not. 

One thing in particular enabled the young man to look 
forward with something like equanimity; he was acquiring 
a reputation for coolness and dexterity in the favorite pur- 
suits of his club associates, and he conceived that with set 
purpose he could materially augment his income. But his 
luck, though he had found it a very nice walking-stick, 
turned out a very poor crutch, liis fixed purpose to win 
money in his games rather interfered with his coolness and 
dexterity. He lost more frequently than he thought rea- 
sonable, when he began desperately to invite his conquerors 
home to his rooms for “ revenge." Then he perceiv^ed 
how Eleanor could help him. 'i he young men, when once 
they saw her, and guessed she was not their friend's wife, 
were eager for another visit. And thus it came to puss, in 
a very short time, that supper and card parties were fre- 
quent events in the rooms in Cork Street. What did Miss 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


233 


Cardigan think of these arrangements? It must be con- 
fessed that, from the first, she took very kindly to them. 
She had, even in the country, preferred male society to 
female, and of late she had had no society at all; and she 
did not imagine that the young gentlemen who came and 
paid her compliments, and made her laugh, supposed her 
to be anything else than the lawful Mrs. Parkin. She was 
all the more ready to fascinate when Jack told her the 
valuable financial turn he expected these parties to do 
them. But the parties 2)roved expensive, and not very 
productive. 

It was about this time that George Cardigan, who had 
hitherto failed to find any clew to his sister’s whereabouts 
(Nature had never intended him for a detective), discov- 
ered — “ by the queerest fluke,” as he said — where she was 
living. One afternoon he was passing through New Bur- 
lington Street, from Regent Street, into Bond Street, when 
he was stopped on the pavement by a boy with a basket of 
bottles on his arm. 

“Please, sir,” said the boy, “can you tell me where 
that is?” showing him a slip of paper, on which was writ- 
ten “ Captain Parkin, — , Cork Street.” 

George did not know, but in a little while he was him- 
self inquiring for Cork Street. A minute or two later, he 
was standing at an open door asking for Captain Parkin; 
it did not occur to George that there might be another 
Parkin in the world of London than the one he sought. 

“ Captain Parkin is gone out, sir,” said the servant. 

“And the — the lady,” asked George, “ er— Mrs. 
Parkin?” 

“ She’s out too, sir. They’ve gone out to dinner.” 

George walked away, and presently entered a modest 
restaurant ofi Piccadill.y. As soon as he had dined he 
strolled away to think what he should do. Up till now bis 
one desire had been to “ get at ” Jack Parkin, and to “ go 
for ” him, but now that he was within measurable striking 
distance, he bethougb him it would scarcely do to rap at 
the door, walk into the house, call the man a villain, and 
knock him down: that would set nothing right that had 
gone wrong. If he could only restore his sister to that 
state, or something like that state, in which she had been 
— or, in which he fancied she had been — a few months ago! 
xV rush of generous, fraternal feeling sullused his heart; he 


234 


A REVEKEKD GENTLEMAN. 


would take her home to his own lodgings, and make her 
good again; he would be gentle with her, he would have 
no reproach for her, and they should be dear brother and 
sister, as they had been in other days; and as the honest 
fellow jDictured this condition of things to himself he had 
to overcome the inclination to shed a tear or two. With- 
out considering counter probabilities, he turned and walked 
off to Cork Street. 

He knocked, and asked this time for Mrs. Parkin. She 
was at home. He sent up his card, and presently followed 
it, to encounter his sister and Jack Parkin together. 

“ This is a surprise, said Eleanor, rising to greet him, 
with sufficient ease of manner, but with a cheek tolerably 
flushed. 

“ How are you, George?’^ nodded Jack. 

Both were in evening dress, and showed the sparkle of 
wine in their eyes, and something of the confidence of wine 
in their bearing. 

“ Thank you,’' said George; “I — I can’t sit down. I 
have only just found out where you lived, Nell, or I should 
have come before. I’ve come to ask you to leave this — ta 
take you home with me out of your life here. Come, 
Nell.” 

Eleanor and Jack looked at each other and laughed with 
a complete mutual understanding which staggered and 
exasperated George. 

” But suppose,” said she; “ that I don’t want to leave 
this? It may seem to you very wicked, but I came of my 
own choice, and am well enough pleased to stay.” 

Then George lost his reckoning altogether, and became 
very angry. 

“ It’s him there,” said he, “ that has made you like 
this! You prefer being with him! Do you know what he 
is?~what everybody would say about him if they knew 
him?’’ 

“ Stop, George,” cried his sister, with some resentment. 
“ Before you say anymore you had better understand what 
you’re talking about. I prefer being with him, because, 
when you made it impossible for me to stay at home, he 
took care of me. I asked him to do it, and he did it at 
once, though he knew he was spoiling, all his prospects for 
my sake! And you — you begin to call him names:” 

“ Well, all right, Nell,” he said, “ It seems I’m a 


A REVEllEKD GENTLEMAN". 


235 


blundering idiot. You say it was me made you leave 
home, and I’m a fool for having expected you to come with 
me now. Very well.” He was too single-minded to have 
more than one clear idea or purpose at a time, and not 
versatile enough, once a purpose was defeated, to disem- 
barrass himself of it immediately, and take up another; 
but he had the intrepidity to defend himself. ” 1 sup- 
pose,” said he, “ it was me, too, that made h'm deceive 
that poor girl he married ’’—with a savage glance at Jack, 
who stood with his shoulder against the mantel-piece — 
“ and it was me that made her run away from Scarborough, 
and it’s me that’s breaking her heart as she lies ill — dying, 
very likely, in her father’s lodgings!” 

‘‘Dying?” exclaimed Jack, turning, and looking rather 
scared. 

There was a pause, in which he and Eleanor gazed at 
each other, and felt, perhaps, for the time, ashamed of 
each other. But Jack reasserted himself. 

‘‘ Stuff!” said he. “ People don’t die of broken hearts 
— any more than of toothache. ” 

“ Some don’t, I daresa}’,” replied George. 

“ But we didn’t know — I hadn’t heard,” said Eleanor, 
who was very much interested, for already she saw a pros- 
pect of legitimising her present position. “ Tell me, 
George, please. What — what is the matter? Is it serious?” 

“ Serious for her,” said George, looking at his sister, 
and beginning to have a glimmer of the meaning this 
might have for her. “ She has had a relapse, I believe, 
since her baby was born.” 

” The baby born!” exclaimed Eleanor, feeling an acute 
pang of jealousy — that, after all, this girl had more inter- 
est in Jack than she. “ Then, Jack,” she said, turning to 
him, “ that other money’s gone!” And she sank into a 
chair and burst into tears. But she wept not because tlie 
money was lost, but because the baby was born. 

“I think,” said George, ‘‘I’d better be going.” He 
paused a moment, and then strode across to Jack Parkin, 
while Eleanor roused herself and stifled her emotion: she 
feared something might happen between the two young 
men. “ You have taken my sister,” said he, looking at 
his fingers; “ if you are a man at all you will keep to her 
now; that is the least you can do.” He did «ot wait for 
an answer, but turned and walked away. 


230 


A REVEHEND GENTLEMAN. 


“ Good-bye/’ said he at the door, anl he was gone. 

He was in haste to get away to peruse the new aspect 
which ev'ents were putting on. If his sister might after all 
be Mrs. Parkins — would not that be the best thing that 
could happen for her and her family, even though her hus- 
band would not bo the kind of maji he would at one time 
liave thought fit for her? But the interview he had just 
had with his sister had taught him something he had never 
guessed before: the horrible conviction had seized him that 
for her present condition of disgrace she had been at least 
as much to blame as her paramour: if he had tempted, she 
had allured, and, by her own confession, she had solicited 
the open scandal of flight. 

As for Jack Parkin, he had had little to say while George 
was present — from utter unconcern, not from fear as to 
the result, he permitted Eleanor to stand between him and 
her brother— and he had nothing to say when he was gone. 
He left the room. 

“ Where are you going, Jack?” asked Eleanor, anx- 
iously. 

“ To the club for a little while,” said he. 

He went out in a turmoil of feeling such as he had not 
kno'vn for many a day. He was a father, and had not 
known it; his wife was dying, and no one had told him. 
Why? Was he outside ihe consideration of every one? 
The Merrydews ignored him, just as his father had cast 
him off. He was living anyhow, with little prospect for 
the morrow, and with a crop of debts springing up thick 
about him. There are moments when a man, by a kind 
of spiritual saltation, finds himself suddenly outside him- 
self, viewing his own conduct as if he were another person; 
Jack Parkin had such a moment then, when he saw that in 
a short month or two he had made himself a social outcast, 
and a gambling adventurer! And he reflected, with a swift, 
wild pang of regret, what he might have been with his wife 
by his side, whose goodness, and tenderness, and patien e 
he could not but think of with a touch of compunctitn. 
For a brief moment or two he had a mind to call a cab and 
drive to Pentonville and be reconciled to his wife; but he 
considered what could then be done with Eleanor? and 
woidd his father be appeased now by such a reconciliation? 
for it was, after all, the consequences of his father’s anger 
that most distressed him. But he must have money, so. 


A IlEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


237 


saying to himself that his wife, if she wanted him back, 
might have written him a line, and that she was probably 
well enough satisfied with a comfortable alimony in lieu of 
himself, he hardened his heart and went to his club. There, 
ill a solitary corner, with a heady mixture at his elbow, he 
began to ask himself, what if his wife— the poor girl whom 
he had deceived — should die? Then he would take the 
baby with him (it would, of course, have to pass into h's 
charge on its mother’s death), take it fondly and humbly 
to his father, who was always foolishly moved by the sight 
of children; he would express sorrow for his conduct 
(which would be genuine enough, for it had brought mmh 
discomfort on himself) ; he would promise to marry Eleano , 
and he would be received back into paternal favor. 

That night he opened his hope to Eleanor, and she agreed 
for the sake of the fulfilment of that hope to receive the 
child — when it should come into their keeping. She seized 
eagerly on this hope, and urged Jack to call for news of 
his wife. He said he would; but he delayed from day to 
day till more than a week had passed. Then, at Eleanor’s 
earnest request, he determined to “ pull himself together ” 
and call at Percy Circus, Pentonville. 


CHAPTER XXXVII. 

BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND THE DEEP SEA. 

Ethel Pakkin was buried in Highgate Cemetery, in 
which she had sometimes pensively walked when her father 
kept school at Hampstead. The only persons who attended 
her funeral were her father, her sister, and Signor Bottiglia. 
The reason of that was that no one beside the inmates of 
10 Percy Circus and the district registrar had been in- 
formed of her death. 

“ I suppose,” Merrydew had said to Kate, “ I must let 
Jiini ^’—meanina: Jack Parkin— “ know somehow.” 

“ Why should you, father?” she had answered with 
vindictive heat. “Ho has not cared what would become 
of her, my poor dear! He let her go, and turned his back 
on her! I would not send him word, so that he might go 
at o]ice and make that other woman his wife! If I could 
keep it from him, ho should never have the pleasure of 
knowing his wife was dead! My dear, dear Ethel! 


238 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


“ I assure you/’ said her father, “ I have no desire to let 
him know — not the least; but I’m afraid he must know 
some time.” 

Merrydevv was only too ready to let his daughter’s deter- 
mination support his own inclination; for he wished to en- 
sure that the next instalment of alimony should be paid, 
that at the very least. So he did not write to Jack Parkin; 
and he delayed writing to the elder Parkin, for the same 
reason. 

While he thus delayed and held back, the monthly in- 
stalment of alimony arrived from Slee, Slee & Son — this time 
at the increased rate of three hundred pounds per annum. 
As he looked at the usual form of receipt which he was ex- 
pected to send back signed he perceived he was beset with 
difiiculties. If he signed that receipt as he had signed the 
others in the name of his daughter, and then had to reveal 
the fact and the date of his daughter’s death! If he did 
not sign it, and at the same time kept and used the money, 
then what? And he must use the money; there were ac- 
counts of one kind and another waiting to swallow up the 
greater part of it. lie would have held the whole matter 
in suspense of he could, till somehow it should decide 
itself; but household and other demands crowded upon him 
day by day and insisted on committing him by their drafts 
upon the money. He was exceedingly uneasy, anxious, 
and irritable, and, to add to his degrading fear of being 
again in a little while left destitute, Kate was without en- 
gagement of any sort, or prospect of engagement. To 
crown all, there was the baby to be fed, and nursed, and 
constantly tended. Finally, the cup of his anxiety was 
filled to overflowing by a note from George Cardigan, who 
wrote that he had found Jack Parkin (he named the ad- 
dress), and that he had spoken of Mrs. Parkin’s serious 
condition; so perhaps Parkin would call and see her! 

Merrydew’s feeling in regard to the whole situation may 
be gathered from the following important conversation he 
had with Kate the day after he had shown her George’s 
note. She came in somewhat warm, with her little mar- 
keting basket in her hand. Putting oti her hat and jacket, 
while her father, sitting at his writing-table, with the string 
of (he cradle across his knees, watched her gloomily, she 
said : 

“ Father, I’ve seen Jack Parkin— in a hansom in Tot- 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


S39 


teiiham Court Road — with a woman, that woman, I sup- 
pose, we have so much reason to love.” 

“ Humph!” said lier father. “ I doii^t like your seeing 
him; iCs ominous. We’ll be seeing him here next. Which 
way was he going?” 

“Neither this way nor the other way,” answered she, 
carelessly, “but along the road.” 

“ You don’t seem to think it matters whether he come 
here or not!” 

“ If he is not ashamed to come, I am not ashamed to see 
him, nor afraid to tell him what I think of him.” 

“ That would be very discreet, my dear,” said he, tart- 
ly. “ You forget that he would discover for the first time 
that his wife is dead!” 

“ Well, what of that, father?” 

“ What of that!” he exclaimed, thinking of the alimony. 
“ I suppose you have never heard of the law,” he con- 
tinued, after a slight pause, “ that a man’s child is his 
property? Now that Ethel is dead, he may come if he 
likes and walk off with the child in his arms, to do what he 
likes with it — give it into anybody’s charge he likes!” 

“ Ethel’s baby that she gave into my keeping to be taken 
away by him to treat as he pleases — to be given up to that 
woman! Did you not yourself, father, hear Ethel’s last 
wish that 1 should keep it and be its mother — and not let 
him have it at all?” 

“I did, my dear. But I’m afraid the law won’t con- 
sider that.” 

“ Then,” said Kate, “ it is a very ridiculous law!” 

“ I think, Kate, my dear, law is not your strong point.” 

“ Probably not, father. But I can’t see what Mr. Jack 
Parkin has ever done for baby that the law should reckon 
it his property.” 

“ My dear,” said -Merrydew, “ he is her father.” 

“ And,” retorted Kate, obstinatelj^ “ Ethel was her 
mother, and gave her to me. I don’t think you love baby 
very much, father.” 

“ My dear,” said her father, pulling at the cradle string, 
“ I will admit that I do not niucli enjoy acting as nurse- 
maid. But we have got into a vicious circle of argument. 
We cannot alter the law. But I assure you I should be 
very pleased if we could find some way of evading it.” 

“ Oh, why haven’t you told me this before!” -she said. 


240 


A REYEllENt) GEisTLEMAit. 


“ Ptcally, child, 1 doiPt know. But I have been worry- 
ing enough about that and other things. I suppose 1 have 
waited for something to show us our way out of the diffi- 
culty. 

“ But nothing has? It seems we must. find our way out 
for ourselves. Of course, he knows now he can find us 
here, but if we go away he woiPt know where to find us.^^ 

Merrydew hesitated a little before answering this. The 
anxiety and the difficulty that beset him behind and before 
would not be got rid of by removal from one neighbourhood 
to another, for the height of his desire was not, as it was 
Kate’s, to retain the custody of the child. 

“ I don’t see, my dear,” he said at length, “ how that 
would settle maUers. If we left this without any trace, 
that might only excite alarm. The child is an heiress — at 
least, 1 suppose she is — and, even if the father at present 
would not be eager to find her, the grandfather would. 
They have law agents in London, and they could set de- 
tectives on, and all that sort of thing. And then if you 
ever make your way on the stage there would be an imme- 
diate risk of discovery.” 

” I could take another name,” said Kate. 

“ Yes,” assented her father, “you could take another 
name. We — we must think that over, my dear. If Ethel 
had only lived we would not have been troubled with this 
at all! We are a wretched, unfortunate family; ill-luck is 
at our elbow wherever we turn!” 

“Please, daddy dear, don’t be down-hearted!” ex- 
claimed Kate, caressing him, and stroking his scanty locks. 
” Oh, how I hate that man! I feel 1 could do anything to 
disappoint and thwart him! To break my poor darling 
bethel’s heart as he did! I believe, father, I could kill 
him! kill him!” 

Her father gazed inquiringly at her, as she stood off and 
emphasized her words with appropriate gesture. 

“Is it very dreadful and wicked, father?” she said, 
meekly. 

“N — no, no, my dear, no,” said he; “but it’s very 
tragic. Do you know, Kate,” he exclaimed, catching 
eagerly at this reason for cheerfulness. “ 1 believe you’ll 
be a great actress yet, and make our fortune! And I shall 
say to myself, ‘ The pains I took to make her read with 
feeling and to enunciate clearly have not been wasted!’” 


A HEVEHEND GEKTLEMAK. 241 

“ You dear daddy! Well, now, shall I make tea? and 
tlieii we’ll be better.” 

“Yes,” said he; “ and I’ll just step downstairs to tell 
them if anyone calls and asks for Mrs. Parkin not to say 
anything, but come up and let us know.” 

From this point the situation rapidly developed. Merry- 
dew was just returning upstairs when a latch-key rattled in 
the door, and Pottiglia entered, and they met almost face 
to face. 

“ Ah, my friend,” cried the cheery Italian. “ I am 
wish to see you. Come in ’ere. 1 have something to tell 
you. 1 am commission to make an offer — ” 

“What!” cried Merrydew, “for my marble mantel- 
piece?” 

“ No — I am sorry — not that. It is for your daughter. 
Oh — I not mean an offer for her fair hand — but it is equal; 
for my friend, my compatriot, Vianesi, want to make her 
princess — ah, well, o’ course you know, princess pour rive 
— princess of fairies in the pantomime he is make for 
Chris! mas. He remember how nice she look before, and 
how well she do. And, though it was not convenant, what 
you say? for him to break engagement — yes, o’ course, I 
know it was for her sister — he offer her a beautiful chance 
again and one pound a week.” 

“ Why,” said Merrydew, “ that is no more— is it? than 
a ballet-girl would get!” 

“ Ah, si,” said Bottiglia, “ but she begin onl.y, and it is 
a chance. But, o’ course, if you do not like — ” 

“ My dear fellow,” said Merrydew, laying his hand with 
a sort of light caress upon his sleeve, “ it is very friendly 
and kind to trouble yourself about my girl at all, and I 
will therefore tell you plainly my reason for hesitating 
about the offer. J cannot afford to let her accept an en- 
gagement tliat would bring in so little money; I really can- 
not, Bottiglia, because I am so situated at present that I 
see no prospect for myself beyond the few pounds I have 
in my pocket.” 

“ Ah, I am sorry. But editors of newspapers, I suppose, 
o’ course, is dam t’ief like all the rest what buys things 
what men do! And some day, o’ course, the pen get tired 
and will no more. Ah, si! I am sorry, very sorry, my 
friend.” 

“ The fact is,” said Merrydew, touched to confidence by 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


242 

Buch unaffected sympathy, “ the fact is— you, of course, 
had no idea of this before, and Kate, by the way, has no 
idea of it now;. so take care in speaking before her — ’’ 

— “ For the last three months our income has been main- 
ly my poor dead daughter’s allowance from her husband — 
her alimony, we call it in England. Now she is dead, of 
course it will come no more.” 

“ Ah, poor girl! what a pity she die! But the child, the 
little Ethel. Will not the villain father — excuse me — pay 
you for the child?” 

“ That,” said Merrydew, “ is part of my trouble. I 
fully expect that the father as soon as he hears of his wife’s 
death will come to take it away.” 

“ Then he do not know she is dead? Per Bacco, my 
friend, do not tell him, and then, I suppose, the all money 
— or, what you say, some money — come all equal. Si; 
that is him. Do not tell, and he will not know.” 

“ Yes, my dear fellow, yes. But you didn’t let me say 
that he has heard she is very ill, and that very likely he 
will come to see her, and then he may find it all out. We 
may keep it from him, you see, for awhile, but not for 
very long.” 

“ Ah, si,” said Bottiglia, perspiring with the interest he 
felt. “We must think — think, my friend. I will think, 
and I am very clever to find the way out of a place where 
one do not like to be. ” 

Merrydew felt cheered and encouraged by this conversa- 
tion to a degree altogether out of proportion to its value. 
It might on all occasions be said of Bottiglia that if he 
could not enlighten he always shed warmth. And Merry- 
dew had need then to have his wits quickened and his 
hopes raised. For early in the afternoon of the very next 
day the critical visit was paid. 

He had been telling Kate over their mid-day meal of the 
offer which Bottiglia had been commissioned to make (he 
thought it wise to let her hear of it from himself first), 
and he had stated his ground of objection to be that he did 
not relish the idea of his daughter figuring before the pub- 
lic in tights. 

“ We can surely do better for you than that, my dear,” 
he had said; “and it would not do to lower yourself to 
begin with by an exhibition of that sort.” 


A revehekd oertlemak. 


S43 


There came a tap at the door, and the little old landlady 
appeared, and said a gentleman was below, who inquired 
for Mrs. Parkin. 


“ What sort of a man is he?’"' asked Kate, at once trem- 
bling and pale with excitement. 

“ A nice, dark, milingtary-looking gentleman,^^ said the 
little old lady; “ an ofhcer-like man.’" 

“ It’s him!” said Merrydew, “ him! What must we 
do, my dear?” 

“We had better ask Mrs. Bolder to show him up — 
hadn’t we?” 

“ Yes, yes; of course.” 

Mrs. Bolder withdrew. 

Kate went immediately to the cradle. “ Help me to 
lift this, father.” She removed the cradle with the sleep- 
ing infant to the farthest corner of the room between the 
fire and the window. That done Merrydew lidgetted away 
toward the folding-door which admitted to the bedroom. 

“ Kate, my dear,” said he, “ I — I am in such a fluster, 
perhaps you will see him first.” 

“ You’re not going to leave me alone with him, father?” 

“ Only for a little, my dear. You can meet him better 
than I can. And if he doesn’t know that Ethel is dead, 
don’t tell him, and then he’ll say nothing about the baby.” 


CHAPTER XXXVJII. 

A SlilPLE SOLUTION. 

A man’s step was heard approaching the door, and Mer- 
rydew disappeared into the bedroom. 1 have already inti- 
mated somewhere that Kate bore a striking resemblance to 
lier dead sister in all but the finer details of expression and 
bearing. It was no wonder, then, that Jack Parkin, when 
he entered the room and saw her standing with her back to 
the light, took her for his wife. 

“ What? Ethel?” he said, stepping up to her at once, 
and taking her hand before she was aware. “You are bet- 
ter, then!” 

Kate’s nerves were strung high with excitement and re- 
sentment; her hand closed tight upon his wrist to keep 
him back without her being quite aware of it; for he was 
coining near, as if he would salute her with a kiss. 


A llEVEKEND GENTLEMAN". 


2U 


“ It’s not Ethel!” she panted. “ How dare you? Are 
you not ashamed to come here, and utter her name even?” 

He saw his mistake, and beaten back with such energy 
from his advance, his self-possession and assurance failed 
him a little. 

“ I beg pardon,” he stammered. “ 1 heard she was very 
ill— dying, it was said.” 

“ And you came hoping to find that true! You are a 
heartless, shameless maul” 

“ Really, Miss Merrydew, that is too bad,” he somewhat 
feebly protested. “ I am not good — I do not pretend to be 
— but I am not so bad as you have always thought me. I 
may see her, I suppose?” and he glanced towards the inner 
door. 

“ You cannot see her!” said Kate, moving round to the 
other side of the table. 

“Will you tell her I am here?” 

“ I cannot.” 

“ I think,” said he, his temper rising, “ I may insist 
upon seeing my own wife.” 

Kate controlled her inclination to fling vehement words 
at him. She merely said: “ Your insistance will make no 
^difference. She never asked to see you. ” 

He looked at Kate a moment; her resolute opposition 
made him stick to his point, like a dog to a worthless bone 
which is denied him. 

“ She would probably not have told you if she had 
wished to see me. She must have thought of me; and she 
is too gentle and forgiving — ” 

Kate interrupted him. His words stung her; she felt 
with a pang of jealousy that they were likely to be true. 
Her anger broke bounds. 

“ Yes,” said she, “ you have always known her weak- 
ness and practised upon it!” A sudden suspicion flew in 
upon her. “ Is it for that you have come? To entice her 
away again? — to make her once more your precious wife? 
Oh, better dead than that! What am I saying? Go away, 
man! We never want to see you again! It would have 
been a happy thing for her if she had never seen you at 
all! And when she had seen you— you! — why she should 
have given you her heart, her honour — everything — ” 

“ You do not understand,” he said, now becoming 
truculent ajid insolently cool. “ I have noticed that one 


A REYEEEND GENTLEMAK. 


245 


woman can never understand the conduct of another. But 
be calm, I am going. My connection with your family has 
never done me anything but harm; it has made me suffer 
in pocket, and prospects, and everything.’^ 

“ Oh, this is dreadful!” exclaimed Kate, her nerves be- 
ginning to yield and tremble, while she looked about for 
succour from her father. “ Will you go away — away at 
once? I cannot bear the sight of you longer!” 

“ There is just one thing more,” said he, “ the child — 
I suppose that’s it there;” he took a step in the direction 
of the cradle, at the same time as he put his hand in his 
breast-pocket. 

” Don’t touch it! Don’t go near it!” cried Kate, again 
alert and tingling with courage as she swiftly took up her 
position to defend the baby. 

“ Oh, I’m not going to murder it, or carry it off!” He 
wrote on a leaf of his note-book, and put the leaf, when 
torn out, on the table. “ If the worst should happen to 
your sister — what the deuce! 1 may as well say it — if she 
should die, I must, of course, take charge of the child; let 
me know at that address, and 1 will see to it.” 

■ ” Whatever should happen,” said Kate, taking the slip 
of paper and teariiig it across and across, “ you will never 
have the child! never!” 

“ 1 think,” said he, pulling on his gloves with a forced, 
but exasperating smile, ” that is scarcely a point, if you 
will excuse my saying so, for you to decide. It would be 
settled by the mother’s death.” 

“ If the mother were dead a hundred times, you should 
not have the child! I still live and mean to live to take 
her place!” 

“What?” he laughed. “Do you propose to be wife 
number two? No, thank you,” he said, turning to the 
door; “ not if a ‘ Deceased Wife’s Sister Act ’ were in 
force. Ha, ha! No more Merrydews for me! My re- 
gards to your father.” 

The door closed; he was gone, and Kate sank into a 
chair, feeling after the terrible stinging things she would 
have liked to say to him. 

“ Oh, what a man he is!” she exclaimed. “ What a 
cruel, cold, wicked man! Oh, father ” — for Merrydew 
now emerged from the bedroom—” why have you left me 
like this to myself! I didn’t know what to say or do!” 


2iCy 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN 


“ Not know what to say or do?^^ he exclaimed, cheer- 
fully. “You’ve said, begad, and done to more purpose 
than I could. Nothing equals a woman’s wit in a crisis 
after all!” 

“ Why, what do you mean, father?” 

“ Mean, my dear? What should I mean, my girl, but 
that you’ve hit upon the very thing we’ve been trying to 
find! Oh, begad, it’s so beautifully simple, too!” 

They were interrupted by a rap at the door, which was 
opened to show Bottiglia’s face. 

“ May I come in?” said he. “ I have come home on 
purpose to see you.” He entered. “ I am commission to 
offer to you, Mees Kate — ” 

“ Not the same thing as last night, Bottiglia?” said Mer- 
rydew. “ Because that shocks our sense of propriety.” 

“ Oh, mais” said Bottiglia; “ pardon, non ! Not that. 
But my compatriot Vianesi, he is just like anoder man, 
when you say ‘ no ’ to an offer he make, he like to do busi- 
ness wid you all the more. Well, he have anoder thing to 
offer Mees Kate — to play in the little musical piec‘e what 
they will open wid — what you say, lever de ridean — for 
t’irty shilling a week.” 

“There, my dear, there!” exclaimed Merrydew, rubbing 
his hands and snapping his fingers. “ I knew our luck was 
going to turn; and it has turned, Bottiglia, by the merest 
accident! Accident, begad? Providence! if ever there 
was any! I told you, Bottiglia, we were expecting a rather 
alarming visit — Bottiglia knows all about it, my dear. Wo 
want to keep the child — you know, Bottiglia.” 

“ Si, si,” answered Bottiglia. 

“ Well, the visit has just been paid, and the way is clear! 
simple as daylight!” 

“What, father? what?” 

“ This, my dear, this. Mr. Jack Parkin took you at 
first for your sister. To think,” said he, held for a little 
by the solemn incongruity, “ that he first thought he saw 
his wife, and then all the time fancied she was in the next 
room, while, poor girl! — poor girl! she is dead and gone! 
Y^ou told him you would in any case take your sister’s 
place. AVell, take it; and take, my dear, take your sister’s 
name; that will make it all secure; because if any one after 
this— not being Parkin himself— should ask for Mrs. 
Parkin, we’ll have a Mrs. Parkin to show.” 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


247 


“ Oh, father,’" said Kate, “ I don’t like that. Me— 
Mrs. Jack Parkin! Oh, I can’t bear the name!” and she 
seemed to shake it off with a shudder, 

“ Why, my dear?” pled Merrydew, anxioasl 3 L “ You 
will only be known by that name to others; we will never 
use it. Well, it is the only way to be quite cafe in keeping 
the child. Don’t you think so, Bottiglia?” 

“ Si, si,” answered the Italian, promptly. “ 1 tole you 
las’ night I would t’ink of some way — and t’at is the very 
same way I t’ink of! Si!” 

“ There!” said Merrydew, triumphantly. “ Then, too, 
you want a name for the stage.” 

” It won’t do for that,’.’ said Kate at once. I can’t, 
father! I can’t!” 

” My dear,’'* he pled, fervently, “ don’t doubt the indi- 
cations of Providence! Kate, I beg of you! And remem- 
ber! — remember your promise, your sacred promise to 
Ethel! It’s for the poor little baby, Kate!” 

” But surely,” said she, there is some other way.” 

‘‘ No other, my dear— no other at all! Don’t you see? 
He wants, we may be certain, to make it up with his fa- 
ther: how is he to do that? Plainly, when he knows Ethel 
is dead,' by taking the child to soften the heart of his fa- 
ther, and by marrying that woman, to put himself straight. ” 

“ And so they are rather rewarded for their wickedness. 
No one suffers but my innocent dear, and perhaps her 
baby! We can’t permit it, father!” 

“ We cannot, my dear! 8o you must take my way!” 

” Yes, father, yes,” she answered, resolutely. ” I will! 
I will! if you think there’s no harm in it.” 

” That’s my dear girl! Of course there’s no harm in it. 
And (here will always be me and Bottiglia to look after 
you. ” 

” Si,” said Bottiglia, laying his hand on his waistcoat 
and bowing low; votre serviteur.'^ And I believe he 
meant it very gallantl 3 L 

“ Of course we cannot stay here. Bottiglia will perhaps 
manage, without saying anything, to explain our going 
away.” 

“Oh! si, si,” said Bottiglia. 


248 


A REV£RE]^I) GENTLEMAN. 


CHAPTER XXXIX. 

HOW KATE BECOMES A STAR, AND MEETS AN OLD FKTEND. 

It was with a feeling akin to regret that Merrydew saw 
the genuine sorrow of the little old lady and her family on 
the day of his and Kate’s departure from Percy Circus. 
He promised to call upon them occasionally, and give Ihem 
the pleasure of his conversation; so he said good-bye with 
great feeling, and drove off, and forgot all about his prom- 
ise; for he was in brisk spirits, that conjured all kinds of 
pleasing prospects before his eyes. He and his daughter 
were migrating westwards with “ bab}^ and cradle, and all” 
— and that meant for him a very great deal. By a simple 
artifice he had secured to himself an income of three hun- 
dred pounds a year, untaxed by any family demands — avail- 
able, every penny, for his own purposes There was a tailor 
in New Bond Street, of whose “ cut ” he had heard words 
of praise; he would go to him and get fitted, and he had a 
very neat figure to fit. He would get himself proposed for 
a club that was not too expensive— where “the feast of 
reason and the flow of soul,” however, did not preclude 
attention to the bill of fare and the wine-list. He would 
— yes, it would be a respectable thing to do — he would join 
the Church and Stage Guild, and do his best to raise the 
morals and lower the draperies of ballet-girls — and his 
intimacy with the stage through Kate would assist him in 
this agreeable mission, and give him an esoteric acquaint- 
ance with the frail creatures which very few of the male 
members of the guild could have. With all this, he would 
now and then write an article, just to keep his hand in. 

Across these delightful visions, however, once and again 
(here shot the misgiving, like a sinister flash of lightning, 
what if Mr. Jack Parkin, or Slee, Sleo & Son, should one 
(lay take it into their head to call at Percy Circus and 
make inquiries, or to go and look at the Register of 
Deaths! To obviate that as much as he could, he wrote at 
once to Jack Parkin, saying Ethel his wife was better now 
than she had ever been, that she would not see him any 
more, and hereby said adieu. At the same time; he sent 
him a five-pound note, in part-repayment of the fifty he 
had borrowed; it was all ho could spare then, but if he 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


249 


cared to accept in discharge of the balance a very fine mar- 
ble mantle -piece of antique design (Merrydew sniggered to 
himself as he wrote that), it was to be seen at Carlo Bot- 
tiglia’s. Merrydew never heard that Mr. Jack Parkin or 
any one else called at Bottiglia^s to inspect his white ele- 
phant. 

For some time he experienced every now and then an ap- 
palling shiver at the thought of discovery, but as he, after 
a few weeks, found that Jack Parkin (whose movements he 
watched as closely as he dared) had left London for the 
Continent, and then as the monthly instalments of alimony 
came with business-like regularity from Slee, Slee & Son 
and they accepted without a word his receipts signed' 
“ Ethel Parkin,^'’ fears ceased to trouble him, and he settled 
down to the enjoyment of his income, and the fulfilment 
of the hopes and desires he had cherished so long. At 
first he had, of course, to pay the greater j^art of the house- 
hold expenses out of the alimony, but as Kate succeeded 
in her chosen vocation this part grew less and less. 

In those first months of Kale’s regular engagement as 
an actress Merrydew committed an indiscretion which had 
an influence on subsequent events, and which had best be 
recorded here. He thought that Slee, Slee & Son might 
be wondering how it was they had never seen the Mrs. 
Parkin of the alimony, though they might be too polite to 
directly ask to see her. He determined that he would no 
longer tempt such a request. So the very next time the 
alimony was paid, instead of sending the receipt by post, 
he contrived to drive with Kate through the City to leave it 
in person. With the excuse that he wanted to “ see a 
man ” on business, he left Kate seated in the hansom at 
the door of the great building where Slee, Slee & Son had 
their office, and ran up the steps. He asked for Mr. Slee, 
and was shown into the presence of the genial old gentle- 
man with the bald head whom he had seen before; with 
him now sat a young man whom Merrydew in his own mind 
called “Son.” 

“ Excuse my bursting in upon you like this,” said he, 
“ but my daughter is waiting below in a cab. We were 
passing, and thought we would just stop to hand in that 
receipt— Parkin matter, you know. ” 

“Oh, yes,” said the genial Slee; “won’t you be 
seated, Mr. — er — 


250 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


“ Merrydew/^ said lie, supplying the forgotten name. 
“No, thank you, 1 must not sit down. I thought you 
might be glad to know in a friendly way that my daughter 
is about to appear at the Variety Theatre in a new piece. 

“ Er — your daughter is on the stage, then — do I under- 
stand?’' 

“ Yes," said Merrydew, “ she has had some footing on 
the stage for some months now; she is getting on very well 
— though no salary to speak of yet," he added, hurriedly; 
for he was stung with a sudden fear lest some one should 
incontinently move to reduce the alimony. 

“ 1 don’t remember having seen the name?" said the 
genial Slee, with a referring eye on “ Son." 

“ Oh, no; of course not," said Merrydew. “ Her stage 
name is ‘ Ethel Newcome ’ — her favourite heroine in fic- 
tion — from Thackeray’s ‘ Newcomes,’ you know." 

“Ah, yes, I see. Ethel Newcome instead of Ethel 
Parkin," said Slee, glancing at the open receipt. “ Very 
good. ’’ 

“ 1 don’t know if you gentlemen," said Merrydew, look- 
ing from the one to the other, “ go to the theatre — ’’ 

“ Sometimes, Mr. Merrydew, sometimes," said Slee, 
with his most genial smile. 

“ Then," said Merrydew, “ if you care to see my daugh- 
ter in this little piece 1 shall be pleased to send you a 
couple of tickets. Oh, no trouble at all. Well, now, I 
must be off. She’s waiting. Good morning." And he 
bustled off downstairs and into a cab, shrewdly guessing 
that if the front window was accessible “ Son ’’ was press- 
ing his nose against it to catch a glimpse of the actress. 

For the sake of the morals of the young I should like to 
be able to say — as many have said before in similar cir- 
cumstances — that in spite of these precautions Merrydew 
was haunted by a dread discovery, which interfered with 
his enjoyment of life by day, and disturbed his sleep with 
hideous dreams by night; but, unfortunately, that would 
not be true, for he appreciated the amenities and pleasures 
of existence which his dishonestly-acquired income pur- 
chased almost as much as if he had worked hard to buy 
them; his digestion was as heallhy and his sleep as sound 
and dreamless as those of any other man possessed of the 
average easy conscience of civilisation. He took his ease 
at his club— the Hyacinth— and played his hand at “ shil- 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


251 


ling whist ’’ of an afternoon with as much satisfaction to 
himself and his companions as the most hyacin thine and 
laborious journalist, barrister, or professor of them all. 
Indeed, if he was not much respected as a clergyman, he 
was very much liked as “ a good fellow,^^ and his acquaint- 
ance was much courted by the younger men especially, be- 
cause of his reputation for Shandean proclivities, and be- 
cause of his connection with the attractive rising young 
actress, known to the public as Ethel Newcome, but to the 
initiated as Mrs. Parkin. 

What with the novelty of club and theatrical life the 
days and weeks passed with flying feet, so that Merrydew 
was astonished when his daughter reminded him one day 
that the anniversary of the birth of Ethel’s baby was at 
hand. 

For Kate herself the time passed with as much speed 
and as much interest as for her father. She had so much 
to do which she enjoyed doing, that day merged into day, 
as it were, with a wink and a breath. She had many 
difficulties to overcome, and many jealousies to turn with 
good humour aside, but she was primed with resolution 
and enthusiasm, so that difficulty and jealousy only stimu- 
lated her to constant effort. When she opened her eyes in 
the morning it was to begin thinking either about the char- 
acter she had to enact in the evening, or the part she had 
to run down to the theatre to rehearse that morning, or a 
part in an old play which she was studying on her own ac- 
count. She practised her music, she went to take lessons 
in dancing from Signor Biondelli (which her father paid 
for). Some hour or two of the day she always contrived 
to spend with the baby, with whom she was as foolish and 
enchanting as the most loving mother could be. She kissed 
the pretty young thing, dressed and undressed it, dandled 
it, and danced round the room with it, and when the baby 
began to utter articulate sounds she taught it to say, 
“Mammy.’’ In short, she made herself so delightfully 
ridiculous, that the elderly nurse, who arrogated to herself 
some freedom of speech, would say, “ Lor’, ni’m, you won’t 
want to do much o’ that when you’ve got two ’r three 
more on ’em.” 

’J’hat was the chief reminder Kate received for a long 
time that she was known as Mrs. Parkin. At the theatre, 
to her dressmaker, and to her milliner — that is to say, to 


252 


A EEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


those with whom she had much iiitercourse — she was known 
as Miss Ethel Newcorne. Indeed, she proposed to her fa- 
ther that the name “ Mrs. Parkin,’^ being of so little use, 
might as well be abandoned altogether. 

“1 only took the name,’’ she said, “in case anyone 
should call about Ethel or baby; nobody has come, and 
nobody is likely, 1 should think, to come now; the mail (so 
she distinguished Mr. Jack Parkin) has been out of Lon- 
don ever so long.” 

“ My dear,” said her affrighted father, “ that’s just a 
woman’s logic to argue that because something has not 
happened for a long time, argal, it will never happen 
again. We don’t know when Parkin, or some one from 
him, may pop in upon us. Then, our friends — my friends 
— have heard me speak of you as Mrs. Parkin; it would be 
excessively odd, and awkward, to change the name. Eo, 
my dear, really, we mustn’t think of such a thing.” 

So Kate submitted, and the name was retained, and as 
time went on, and her private acquaintance widened, 
“Mrs. Parkin ” more frequently saluted her ear. And 
time did pass on very swiftly. 

Kate had better fortune than most young ladies who 
aspire to success on the stage, and who are not prepared to 
win favour or fame otherwise than by their talent, yet it 
took her five years’ hard work to win recognition. It is 
beside the purpose of this story to describe her progress — 
her struggles, her disappointments, her almost ascetic devo- 
tion to her art —it is the successful result that demands our 
attention. In five years — spent without a single holiday, 
except those the law imposes, for even in the season of va- 
cation at the London theatres she was taken up with pro- 
vincial engagements — after five years, 1 say, the crtics dis- 
covered that short cm tain-raising pieces, like “ Kulh’s 
Iiomance,” were worth seeing for the sake of the acting of 
Miss Ethel Newcorne. Humble theatre-goers, who are in 
their seats before the curtain rises, had discovered that long 
before. Even after the discovery was made by the critics, 
they, being a timid and sheep-like race, waited for some- 
one to begin the game of praise and adulation in print. 
At length the young gentleman who did the theatres for 
“ The Weekly Tester ” uttered half a column of enthusi- 
astic commendation, and then the other critics made haste 
to leap the broomstick after him. Thereafter she began to 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


253 


be noted by persons who were considered, or who considered 
themselves, eminent judges and patrons of dramatic art, 
and being a young lady of great al tractiveness, she was a 
good deal talked of. To be talked to, in that case, is but 
a step from being talked of, and Kate was asked here and 
there. And thus she emerged from her obscurity, and be- 
came a shining star in the firmament. 

Her first introduction to that section of the social world 
where fashion and art meet and make believe to fraternise 
was made at the Sunday reunions of a distinguished 
“ actor-manager,^^ to use the cant compound of the day. 
Her father accompanied her to these assemblies (with more 
alacrity than he had ever gone to church), and the agree- 
able persons whom they met took to sending invitations to 
“ the Eeverend Mr. Merrydevv and Mrs. Parkiu,^^ which 
Kate insisted for awhile in declining, in spite of her father’s 
protestations that she would spoil, or at least diminish, 
her chances of advancement. 

“ 1 can’t go, father,^’ she would say. ‘‘You can’t ac- 
cept other people’s attentions and hospitality without show- 
ing them some in return. And we can’t ask people here!” 
with a sweeping gesture, comprehending the room in which 
they sat. “ Besides, dear, we can’t afford it yet.” 

“ My dear,” said her father, “ I have told you a hun- 
dred times we ought to go into proper apartments. We 
can quite well afford it.” 

” You are very good, daddy dear, but do you think I am 
going to let you spend in that way the money you write so 
hard to earn? We shall go into a flat of our own, daddy, 
as soon as 1 am able to bear my proper share of the ex- 
pense. ” 

So it came about that in the fulness of time, when Kate’s 
salary, as well as her reputation, was increased, they mi- 
grated to a fiat in Cromwell Road, where they were no 
sooner settled than Merrydew began to indulge his hospitable 
inclinations. He contended for a Sunday of their own, 
an “ At Home,” at which they would receive their friends. 
Kate demurred. She hated “ At Homes ” with their 
thin, insincere talk, their shavings of bread and butter, 
and their weak, tepid tea at two shillings a pound. Her 
father confessed he was not himself enamoured of Ihese 
vapid gatherings, but he held out for “ sometliing 
sociable ” once a fortnight or so. On this basis a com- 


254 


A KEVEREJSID GENTLEMAN. 


promise was effected, and there was established what Mer- 
rydew called “ The Fortnightly Review."’ He announced 
to his friends at the Hyacinth Club that he and his daugh- 
ter, Mrs. Parkin, would be at home on Sunday, and every 
other Sunday thereafter, from seven o’clock in the evening 
— there would always, he said, be a bit of dinner or sup- 
per, or “ something ” going, but no “ formal feeding ” — 
and Kate asked two or three of her particular friends at 
the theatre to come and keep her in countenance. At the 
next reunion at the distinguished actor-manager’s. Merry- 
dew went farther, and informed such of those terrible per- 
sons, called dramatic critics, as he could get access to, that 
if they cared to “ look round ” in the course of the even- 
ing they might see one or two agreeable people. 

“ Pettychose is coming,” said he. “ We’ll get her to 
sing her Bangles Song. ” 

“ Isn’t he a rip?” said Leo Adolescens, of “ The Daily 
Wire,” to stout old Button of “ The Look-out.” “The 
Newcome’s father, I mean. A nice pastor he to entice a 
little Amaryllis like Pettychose to sing her song on a Sun- 
day! I suppose he’s told you? Confound him! what 

does he mean by asking us to his d d kick-up? Will 

you go? Up three pair of stairs, I daresay. Look; he’s 
on to Lord Bob now.” 

These two estimable theatrical reporters observed nar- 
rowly the reception which young Lord Robert Stickney, a 
notable patron of the drama, accorded to Merrydew; they 
saw from the inclination of his head that he was saying 
something like, “ Oh, delighted. Pm sure,” and they 
glanced at each other. 

“ You’d better go,” said Button, with a grin. “ You’ll 
meet one or two decent people, I daresay; so be a good 
boy. Unfortunately, I must get home and take my wife 
to church.” 

Merrydew shrewdly endeavoured, like a careful father, 
to advance his daughter’s interests at the same time as he 
was bent on making the “ Fortnightly ” a social success. 
The little drawing-room of Mrs. Parkin (Kate had heard 
herself addressed so often by the name that she answered 
it now as if it were her own) soon became a recognised 
place of meeting on every other Sunday evening for a few 
actors and actresses, artists and jounialists, and others who 
had an enthusiasn; for the stage, and who were therefore 


A heveuend gentleman*. S55 

for the most part youjig. 1 believe, however, that this de- 
votion to the stage was very much a pretence, and that at 
least one-half of the devotees were more interested in the 
future of the agreeable Incarnation of Thalia who was their 
hostess, than in the large and misty prospects, of Dramatic 
Art in general. No suspicion of this invaded the serenity 
of the Fair Muse herself, because, it must be admitted, 
their worship was of a distant and respectful sort, and be- 
cause it did not enter her head that there were any warm 
devotional exercises in progress. It was whispered after 
awhile when this man and that disappeared from the reg- 
ular circle, that they had been bold enough to solicit the 
honour of taking Mr. Parkin’s place, and had received a 
gentle, but distinct refusal, which in their chagrin they 
had turned into a dismissal; and the still faithful worship- 
pers would joke about themselves as the wooers of Penel- 
ope, and wonder if the much-travelled Odysseus would re- 
turn one day and put them to terrible rout and slaughter 
with his long bow. “ Where is Mr. Parkin? Was there 
ever a Mr. Parkin?” These were the questions — like 
riddles for a shilling dreadful — which, as Kate continued 
obdurate to sentimental influences, the young men (and 
the old men, too, for that matter) began to propound to 
each other when they met out of-doors. 

Kate, for her part, held on her serene way. Whenever 
she thought of a husband’s love — and what healthy girl 
with a sweet, full heart does not sometimes? — it was only 
to put the thought aside, with a curious wonder that so 
many women should seem to think so much about having 
a man to love them. Her sister’s experience of a man’s 
love was a very sordid, a very terrible one; indeed, all that 
Kate had seen or known of men — including even her father 
— led her either to pity, or to dislike, or to tolerate, or 
even sometimes to admire, but never to love. Perhaps, as 
she thought, a pleasant reminiscence of one man rose upon 
her, whom she had known long ago when she was a poor 
worried governess, the young man who had stood by her 
when the dreadful Alderman Cholmley bullied her and 
turned her away. Yes; young AValter Cholmley had been 
very “ nice;” he had always talked to her kindly and sensi- 
bly, never patronisingly, yet always protectingly. Yet, in 
her engrossed attention to her Art, she would probably 
have forgotten that she had ever recalled that time, if it 


A EETEllENI) GENTLEMAN’. 


25 G 

had not been that, as Fate would have it, Walter Cholniley 
appeared before her again, to her pleased surprise, to re- 
sume acquaintance. That came about in this wise: 

A clay or so after Kate and her father had returned to 
London from provincial engagements, in the month of 
September, when “ scarcel 3 Muiybody was in town (except 
the four millions who are always there), Merrydew entered 
the smoking-room of the Hyacinth Club. There were 
only three or four men present. He had little more than 
seated himself with the “ Pail Mall Gazette "’in his hand, 
when he heard a voice at his elbow — a pleasant, resonant 
voice — say in an inquiring tone, “ Mr. Merrydew?” He 
turned, and saw a tall, broad-shouldered gentleman, of 
agreeable aspect, bending over him. 

“ Yes,” said Merrydew, “ that’s my name.” 

” My name is Cholniley,” said the gentleman, drawing 
up a chair and presenting his card. “ Forgive me if I in- 
terrupt you.” Merrydew put away his paiier. “I am 
told the actress called Miss Kewcome is your daughter.” 

“ She is,” said Merrydew, sitting up, partly with pride, 
partly with apprehension. 

“A daughter,” continued Cholmley, “of yours, 1 be- 
lieve, was in my father’s at Hornsey as governess five or 
six years ago?” 

“Ah, 3 "es,” said Merrydew; “yes, I remember. And 
she left that through — through a scrape of mine. 
Awkward, but couldn’t be helped, you know.” 

“ Just so,” said Cholmley. “ Then this Miss Kewcome 
is she — unless, of course, you have other daughters very 
like her.” 

“ Yes,” said Merrydew, a trifle uncomfortable; he did 
not know where this cross-examination was meant to land 
him; “yes, that’s she. She— er — is called Mrs. Parkin 
now.” 

“ So,” said Cholmley, looking down, “ I’ve heard from 
a friend I have here — I don’t belong to this club, you 
know. My friend tells me, too,” continued he, with some 
constraint, “ that Mr. Parkin is — is dead.” 

“Yes,” said Merrydew, “ he’s gone. Perhaps you’ll 
come and see us? Come on Sunday evening.” 

“It will give me very great pleasure.” 


A HEVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


257 


CHAPTER XL. 

THE OLD FRIEND IN A NEW LIGHT. 

On Sunday evening Cholmley appeared in the Merry- 
dew flat in Cromwell Road. It so happened — the weather 
being bad, and the season being September — that there was 
no other visitor besides the constant Bottiglia, who, with 
fresh-shaven face, in clean collar and gorgeous neck-tie, 
was volubly explaining to Merrydew his latest scheme for 
getting the better of Fortune. Kate, of course, had been 
forewarned by her father of Cholmley’s coming. When 
he was announced she rose, and went to meet him with a 
rare smile. Formal greetings over, he seemed a trifle em- 
barrassed, but Kate at once set him at ease. 

“ It makes me feel again, said she, “as if I were a 
governess to see you here. How are your sisters?’^ 

He spoke at first Iialf-absently, scrutinising Kate closely, 
and evidently not quite sure that this grand and famous 
woman was the liltle governess he used to take under his 
protection. Kate instinctively understood that, and was 
quite easily her own simple, bright self. So — Merrydew 
being engaged with the demonstrative Bottiglia — he soon 
settled down into her society. And hers was society which 
many a man besides one who may be called an old lover 
would have found exceedingly agreeable, and in which most 
men would have been in danger of becoming lovers. 

Kate, in the first place, had as few of the failings of her 
“ profession as any actress could have; she was not, as 
some actresses are, while graceful or neat on the stage, un- 
tidy and tawdry at home; nor was she always jealously 
grumbling or spitefully insinuating, as some are; nor did 
she find everything uninteresting, except her own pursuits, 
and especially her owii interests, as many, perhaps most, 
do; she was always neatly and nicely dressed. I will not 
say she was always good-tempered, because no woman who 
is worth much, and especially no actress, is always in a sweet 
and placable temper, but she was neither very vain, nor 
very envious, and she had that charming composure, that 
gentle self-reliance which successful effort induces upon a 
good woman. All that, we may be sure, Cholmley was 


m 


A REVEIiEXD GEJsTLEMAiC. 


keenly conscious of as he sat near her — as well as of the 
full sweetness of womanhood that breathed from her pei- 
son. In figure and face she was altered much from what 
she had been when he knew her at his father’s. She had 
now attained, we must remember, the age after which a 
woman commonly resigns herself to remain single; she was 
twenty-five, and of fine (not ample) womanly proportions; 
her figure was not of the kind that loudly challenges, but 
that gently invites, attention, and her face charmed every- 
bod3\ The eyes and mouth were its chief features of 
beauty. Her mouth, which on the stage has uttered com- 
monplace sentences so that men and women have cried or 
laughed pretty much as she pleased, was not a thin, mer- 
cenary mouth like Miss A ’s, nor a stupid, conceited, 

carelessly-shaped mouth like Mrs. B ’s, nor was it 

merely a ground for laying on rouge-paste, like Mrs. 

C ’s, nor yet a full, pouting mouth like Miss D ’s; 

it was a well-curved mouth, not very small, with the lips 
barely touching each other, and with a something linger- 
ing about their corners which kept one uncertain whether 
the next tone uttered would be serious, or merely frank, 
or jocose. Her eyes were such as, I fancy, poor Peg 
Woffington’s must have been, except that they may have 
had more steadfastness and less mischievous sparkle, as be- 
came their English origin. 

All these charms had the effect on Walter Cholmley 
which he was prepared to allow them to have. He talked 
with Kate about his people, but all the time he was think- 
ing of herself, and how effort and success (with, perhaps, a 
touch of sorrow) mature and enrich the nature of a good 
woman. He told her that his father was dead (“ So, 
you’re a great man now,” said Kate. “ Big enough to be 
great,” said he); that one of his sisters was married to 
Alderman Sir Peter Cumber, and the other was waiting 
for some one to turn the leaves of her music, and that she 
and their molher lived with him now in Chelsea — “and,” 
said he, “ you must come to see us.” 

“ But,” said she, “you haven’t told me about your- 
self.” 

“ I have nothing to tell,” said he, “except that I am 
getting older and lazier. The life of such a lawyer as me 
is very uneventful.” 

“ But you wear a wig and gown, and make tremendous 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 259 

speeches aud terrible cross-examinations in court, don^t 
you?^^ said she. 

“ No/^ he answered; 1 get bills through Parliament; 
iPs a tolerably dull, but rather a profitable kind of busi- 
ness.-’^ 

“ Oh, you’re in Parliament, then?” said Kate. 

Well, yes, I’m in Parliament too, I’m the honorable 
member for Shepherd’s Bush. But, come now,” said be, 
“ what about yourself. I have often thought of you. Do 
you remember that, when you left Hornsey, you were go- 
ing to let me find you a situation?” 

“Do you remember that?” said Kate, smiling with 
pleasure. “ Oh, yes, I remember. But I was not able to 
go into one for some little time, and then I did not like to 
trouble you.” 

Cholmley took it for granted she was alluding to the cir- 
cumstances — whatever they were — which had made her 
Mrs. Parkin; he suspected he was near delicate ground, so 
he turned away from it. “ And so,” said he, “ you went 
on the stage. I should never have expected, you know, to 
find you an actress; you used to be so quiet.” 

“ And do you think, then,” said she, “ that acting is 
such a noisy business?” 

“ Well,” said he, “ I do think there is commonly a good 
deal more thunder than lightning about it. Still, that is 
not what I meant. I knew you were clever, and that'you 
observed people very closely, and that you had a wise little 
head; so I should not have been surprised to find you an 
author.” 

“ Thank you,” said Kate, coloring. “But perhaps the 
public has lost nothing in hearing me speak other people’s 
words rather than reading my own. ” 

Thus their acquaintance was re-established on a very 
agreeable aud intimate basis. In a few days there came 
an invitation to lunch at Oholmley’s house. Dinner was 
out of the question for Kate, except on Sunday, aud that 
day, by Mrs. and Miss Cholmley, was consecrated to chapel- 
going. Merrydew, of course, accompanied his daughter, 
and for the first time he suspected the end Cholmley might 
have in view in renewing acquaintance with Kate. Yet it 
was not Cholmley’s own behaviour that raised this sus- 
picion, but the cold, jealous reflection of it which he saw in 


260 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


the manner, and the hint of it which he heard in the tones 
of the mother and sister. 

Merrydew had seen his daughter for so many years go 
fancy-free, he had seen her so taken up with her art, that 
the possibility of her getting married had never troubled 
him. Now the probability rose before his eyes, and smote 
him with anxiety and dread. That she should think now 
-—after omitting it so long — of taking to herself a husband, 
seemed in some sort a breach of faith. 

When the visit to the Oholmleys was over he went off to 
his club to take a thoughtful view (through the smoke of 
a cigar and a tumbler of his favourite mixture) of the re- 
sults of such a contingency. 

Kate might certainly — when the occasion was presented 
to her — be willing, or even might wish, to marry, if not 
this Cholmley, then some time hence another man. The 
possibility would always be lying there, fruitful of anxiety. 
It was, after all, quite natural that she should marry some- 
body; she was young (comparatively), healthy, and very 
attractive. Marriage implied change of name. If Kate 
threw off the name she was now wearing, then what would 
happen to him? There rose before him in sickening array 
the inevitable perils of the course he had taken six years 
ago, which, as time went on, must become more and more 
threatening. Not only loss of the alimony (that seemed 
now comparatively a small matter), but a demand for ex- 
planations, to be followed by a disagreeable exposure, if by 
nothing more drastic. Yet what could he do to avoid 
them? Prevail upon Kate to remain single? Then an 
eligible suitor for Kate’s hand would be lost! Perhaps 
one day a duke, or an earl’s heir, or a judge would come 
to kneel at her feet; she would not be the first actress who 
had seen a great man in that position. He could do noth- 
ing, and nothing needed to be done at present. For the 
evil day was not nearly at hand, and why should he shake 
himself with alarms that might prove to be vain? He 
would trust still to that singular Providence (for whom he 
had a superstitious regard) who had never yet left him in 
any hole into which he had got himself. 

So he sat down to his dinner that evening with great 
cheerfulness, and with a very tolerable appetite. He 
slept, however, at night rather restlessly; but that w^as 
due, no doubt, to the unusual excitation of mind into which 


A EEVERJlND GEKTLEMAK. 


261 


he had thrown himself before dinner, and not to any pre- 
monition of future events. 


CHAPTER XLL 

THE HOUSE IH CHEYHE WALK. 

From that Sunday, Cholmley was on the footing of a 
recognised and trusted friend of the house. At The 
Fortnightly Reviews he became a prominent figure, and 
speedily excited the suspicion and jealousy of the wooers by 
the self-possession with which he took upon himself to as- 
sist his hostess to entertain and amuse. It was noticed, 
too, that when all the other visitors and guests were saying 
“ Good night,’^ he showed no intention of saying anything 
of the sort. 

One of these evenings, when all had gone save himself 
and Bottiglia, Cholmley declared to Kate he wondered how 
she could keep these crowded gatherings on in such small 
rooms. 

“ It is what 1 always say,^^ chimed in Bottiglia, “you 
can ^ave nice villa in nice suburb, wit^ fine big door and 
window — what you say, bow-window — and six, eight, ten 
room all to yourself for moch less — oh, very moch less — 
than you pay for dese.^^ 

“ Of course,'^ said Kate, “ I should prefer a house with 
airy rooms. But I donT think that^s to be had for the 
rent we pay here; and then there’s the expense of more 
furniture.” 

It was very soon after that talk that Cholmley brought 
to Kate a proposition that she should become the tenant of 
a house in Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, which, he said, had been 
left on his hands by a defaulting bankrupt, who had been 
so far honest towards his landlord as to leave his furniture 
behind. Most of this, Cholmley said, Kate would not like, 
but such articles as she cared for she might have at a 
nominal price. The house, too, he would let at a low rent 
to secure a good tenant. 

“ He want a good tenant, eh, my friend?” said the 
shrewd and observant Bottiglia, in a whisper to Merrydew. 
“ What you t’ink?” And he compassed a very expressive 
smile and a wink. 

The result of this was that Mrs. Parkin was domiciled in 


262 


A REVEREKD GEKTLEMAK. 


No. — , Cheyue Walk, before Christmas. In the interest 
and excitement of superintending its decoration and the 
furnishing of it, and of politely ordering dilatory workmen 
about, or showing stupid workmen how to do a thing neat- 
ly, Merrydew was in his original element, and forgot the 
forebodings that had been afflicting him. He was never 
tired of pointing out to Kate, or Cholmley, or Bottiglia, 
how convenient the house was; it looked very large, but it 
was not too large for them, the lower part being almost 
entirely cut off by a wide gateway — which not only neatly 
abridged the house, but also kept the room over it as dry 
as a bone; all living rooms, he declared, should be like 
that — practically in the air. Then, too, he secretly did a 
deed of munificence, which deserves to be chronicled. The 
marble mantel-piece of antique design was brought from 
the back shed where it had lain in obscurity for years, and 
set up, amid rejoicings, by himself and Bottiglia, and an 
ancient worker in mortar, in the front drawing-room. 

On the first Sunday of the New Year Kate gave a 
“house-warming^^ party — and not only were there pres- 
ent several both of the Picninnies and the Joblillies of the 
theatrical world, but the Great Panjandrum himself looked 
in for a little while. Walter Cholmley, of course, was 
there too, as were his mother and sister (at his express de- 
sire). But these two excellent ladies in that assemblage of 
simple, but frivolous people were as much out of their ele- 
ment as the Reverend Isaac Watts, D.D., would have been 
in the company of the Great Panjandrum. They stayed 
through dinner, and then, as quickly as they could with 
civility, they withdrew, in shuddering horror of the ex- 
tremely secular talk to which they had had to listen. 

There was, however, one reverend gentleman in the 
company who enjoyed himself very much. Mr. Merrydew 
was quite at home. He discussed with fervour the points 
of a comic opera which had been produced the evening be- 
fore. He maintained, against Kite, the veteran theatrical 
critic, that in a certain love-scene there was “ too much 
fiddling.’" Presently he encountered the composer of the 
new piece, and congratulated him on its success. 

“ Pettychose was capital,” said he. “ She’s here. We 
must get her to sing us one or two of her little things— 
c/wses—eh? But in that love-scene there was too 
much fiddling— oh, yes; you must cut some of that out.” 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


2G3 


“Kite doesn’t think so,” said the composer. 

“ Kite!” exclaimed the reverend gentleman. “ Kite is 
no critic of play-making or play-acting, he is only a stout 
collection of play-bills, old and new.” 

At the same time Kite was saying to a comrade, “ The 
parson is setting up for a critic. We’d better look out; 
he’ll go otferiug to do our work on the papers for noth- 
ing.” 

“ I do mine for very little more,” said his comrade. 

And in such agreeable, simple, and friendly talk the time 
passed. After dinner, the Petty chose did sing one or two 
of her little things, to the especial delight of her assiduous 
admirer. Lord Robert Stickney. Merrydew, too, was so 
enamoured for the time by the little burlesque actress that, 
later on, he was surprised by “ Lord Bob ” standing with 
her by the window, admiring the make of her dress, and 
slyly and daintily counting with his finger the little open 
spaces in her short trellis- worked kind of sleeve — “ One, 
two, three.” 

But this removal into better and more roomy quarters 
brought some trouble to Kate, and at one time threatened 
even to cause a rupture in the cordial relations between her 
and Cholmley. It somehow got to be known among the 
wooers and others that the house was Cholmley’s, and that 
he had had something to do with providing its furniture. 
There was in this, as we know, just the requisite amount 
of truth for the arch mischief-maker and his children to 
turn out the feasible, neat kind of scandal they delight in: 
Mrs. Parkin — the virtuous, the severe — was no better, 
after all, than other actresses. “Liana Newcome ” (as 
she was sometimes called) was Diana no longer; she was 
transformed into Venus of the golden girdle; the big law- 
yer had put her into a house, and was paying all its ex- 
penses. This ill-natured and irresponsible gossip was soon 
conveyed to Kate’s ears by a kind female friend. I am 
sorry to say no one delights in a bit of scandal about a 
woman so much as one of her own sex. Kate in her shame 
and resentment at once sat down and wrote a note to Wal- 
ter Cholmley, saying she was sorry she must cease to be his 
tenant, but there were cogent reasons why she must leave 
the house immediately. Cholmley, astonished at this let- 
ter, and actually pained by its tone, called at Cheyne Walk. 
Kate was not in, but was expected. He waited, and thus 


264 


A llEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


encountered Merrydew, from whom, in his excitement, he 
could not keep the reason of his coming. 

“ I think I know why she wrote to you like that,^’ said 
Merrydew, and he told him, with little show of indigna- 
tion, what was being said. “ Perhaps, said he, with some- 
thing of a leer, “ the former tenant was a person of that 
sort, eh?'' But he had no sooner said that than he re- 
gretted it. The big lawyer looked wroth enough to throw 
him out of the window. 

“ What an abominable suspicion, Merrydew!" he ex- 
claimed. “ Not very respectful of you towards your daugh- 
ter, either, that you should have let her come into the house 
if you suspected such a thing!" 

“ My dear Cholmley," he began, but the entrance of 
Kate cut his apology off, and he discreetly retired. 

“ Mr. Cholmley!" said Kate, blushing deeply; “I didn't 
know you were here." 

‘‘ But you can guess," said he, “ why I have come?" 

Yes," said she, “ about what 1 wrote to you, 1 sup- 
pose. 1 must go, Mr. Cholmley. It's not, believe me," 
she continued, hurriedly, “ on account of anything you 
have said or done." 

And again she blushed. 

“Don't," said he, “distress yourself to tell me. I 
know; your father has just told me. I am very sorry in- 
deed. It's a scandalous shame!" 

“ It was very foolish, I see now," she said, with a severe 
restraint upon herself, “ to have come into the house at all 
as I did. I might have guessed what people would say 
about an actress!" 

“ Come," said he, “ you must not think of it so bitter- 
ly. It will be a nine-days' talk, and then it will be for- 
gotten." 

He did not really think so lightly of the matter, but he 
did not know what to say; he was longing to pour out all 
his heart to her, but her severe manner made him fear a 
repulse. 

“ Oh," she cried, “it is impossible for me to stay! I 
can't stay! Don't try to prevail upon me!" 

He was silent a moment; should he, or should he not, 
risk a declaration? Kate, anxious lest his silence meant 
displeasure, glanced wistfully at him. That glance he- 
caught full, and it did his business, 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


2G5 


“ There is one way/^ he said, “ of settling the matter.” 

He took her hand; she saw his look; she felt how he was 
moved, and she knew what he meant; her eyes fell. 

“ Kate,” said he, “I had not intended to speak so soon; 
I thought 1 would wait till you knew me better. But I 
think you know that 1 love you. Can you — can you care 
enough for me to be my wife, Kate?” 

“ Are you sure,” she asked, in a low voice, while she 
still looked down, “ that you mean that? — that you are 
not hurrying yourself into saying what you may regret be- 
cause I am in a little trouble?” 

“Sure, Kate? Of course, I^m sure. Tell me, Kate, 
that I may have your promise.” 

“You might rue it,” said she, “ if you had an actress 
for a wife.” 

“But you — ydu love me, Kate, or you would not think 
of that.” 

“ 1 — I care for you very much, Walter,” she said, frank- 
ly, raising her eyes a moment. He at once seized the 
privilege which that confession seemed to accord him. 
“ VV^e must talk seriously about it,” said she, when she 
was released. “ We are not children. Even if 1 were 
married, I am afraid 1 could not live with satisfaction 
without the stage. And then, how would your mother 
and sister like to see an actress your wife?” 

“ They will have to like,” said he; “ and I know they 
will soon be fond of you. And as to the stage, please 
yourself, darling, though 1 should prefer that you left it. 
But you have not promised me yet.” 

“ 1 think, Walter, you must not press me now. There 
are two or three things I must think over first, and — and 
things 1 must tell you about myself.” 

“ Oil,” he urged, impatiently, “ I know all that.” 

“No, Walter dear,” said she, looking at him earnestly, 
“you don’t. 1 cannot, dear, for your own sake, answer 
you, believe me.” 

So it was finally agreed that he would wait till she signi- 
fied she was ready to give him a clear answer, and that she 
would still remain in the house. 

Kate thought over all this, and her awkward position as 
Mrs. Parkin, a good deal in secret, before she spoke to her 
father. 

“ I don’t know,” said he, pettishly, when she had told 


266 


A KEVEKEND GENTLEMAN. 


him that Choi ml ey had asked her to be his wife, “ what 
you want to get married at all for. YouVe a house of 
your own, an income, and a profession of your own, and a 
position in society of your own, too! What more do you 
want, my dear?^^ 

“ That is not the question, father,^^ said she. “ What 
I want to know is, have 1 your permission to tell Walter 
that 1 am not Mrs. Parkin?’" 

“ 1 can’t give you my permission off-hand, my dear. 
There are interests, and — and things at stake. You always 
bring me some worry when 1 am already burdened with 
them.” 

“ Very well, father,” said she, dutifully. “I can wait 
a little, of course.” 

“Yes,” said he, “1 must think about it — I must 
think.” 

'For some time he carefully avoided giving his daughter 
an opportunity to repeat her question. He had not come 
to any decision when events occurred which made a de- 
cision unnecessary. 


CHAPTER XLII. 

THE PRODIGAL HUSBAND’S RETURN. 

Basinghall Street at one o’clock of the day is always 
busy with foot-passengers; but when its narrow roadway is 
“ up,” and being leisurely explored by the commissioner 
of city sewers and his merry men, when heaps of black, 
oozy soil crumble down upon the pavement on either side, 
and great trestles insist upon having one foot on the kerb, 
then Banisghall Street is absolutely congested, and men 
struggle or squeeze past each other as well as they can, 
and preserve their tempers as best they may; and when to 
these conditions is added the aggravating one of a steady, 
fine spring drizzle, what with the slipping feet below and 
the umbrellas surging above, the commissioner of sewers, 
from his ample lair between the two human torrents, must 
enjoy the fun. 

On such a. day two men — one with an umbrella, the 
other without — scrambled out of the stream on to the wide 
steps of one of the large buildings. 

“ B it!” exclaimed the man without the umbrella 


A EEVEKEND GENTLEMAN". 267 

— a dark man, with a moustache, and with his shoulders 
drawn up as if his chest wanted ease. 

“Rather a tight fit/^ said the other, glancing at the 
surging pavement, as he let down his umbrella, and turned 
to enter the building. 

“ 1 want to find Slee^s,^^ said the first, hurriedly, and 
then broke into a fit of coughing so violent that he had to 
lean against the name-board for support. When the fit 
was over, he stood a moment or two, gasping out a mixt- 
ure of French and English oaths, while the other stood and 
looked at him as if he would say, “ Now, where have I seen 
you before?’^ 

“ This happens to be the place,^^ said he: “ I"m James 
Slee.^^ 

“ Oh. Thank you. My name is Parkin — Captain Par- 
kin; you know it, perhaps?'"’ 

“ I thought," said James Slee, “ I remembered having 
seen you." 

“ Ah! You're ‘ Son,' I suppose?" 

“ Yes. I'm ‘ Son.' You want to see my father, I dare- 
say?" 

Captain Parkin looked at him. He was a dapper City 
young man, with no apparent harm about him, except per- 
haps in his eyes, which were sharp and a trifle sidelong in 
their action; but the effect of the eyes was counteracted by 
the wide good-nature of the mouth. 

“ I want to see somebody," said Parkin. “ Excuse me 
a moment, this b d cough!" 

“ It shakes you," said Slee. “ Come upstairs with me; 
1 can give you a drop of something." They went up, 
rather slowly. “ Father's just gone to lunch," said the 
son, entering the warm, well-furnished room of the senior. 
“ Let me doctor you." 

“ Oh, anything you like," said Parkin. 

The amiable young man went to the safe and took out a 
decanter of wine. “ It's the governor's best sherry," said 
he, and Captain Parkin looked at him, and thought of the 
day when he would have enjoyed appropriating a glass of 
the governor's best sherry. Then Slee went into his own 
room and brought out a phial, from which he poured a few 
drops into the glass of sherry. “ Balsam of Aniseed," said 
he; “ best stuff 1 know for a cough." 


208 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAlf. 


“ You seem to take care of yourself/' said Parkin. “ 1 
wish to G — d 1 had!" 

After that there was some degree of friendliness between 
them. 

“ You've been about a good deal, captain," said Slee, 
“ the last few years. Let me see; I think you were at 
Cairo when we last heard from you. " 

“Yes." 

“ And you’ve been, haven’t you? in Paris, and Nice, 
and Vienna, and in Constantinople, in the service of the 
Turks," continued Slee, as if inviting him to tell all 
about it. 

“ Yes," said Parkin, “ and the devil knows where be- 
sides." 

“ How 1 should like to have been you!" said the young 
man. 

“ Would you? On two hundred a year! I suppose, 
since you know I’ve been in all those places, you know 
about my allowance; I want an advance; your father can 
manage it for me?" 

“ I can’t say. I daresay he can, but you had better see 
himself about that. But — excuse me, captain," exclaimed 
he, suddenly sitting erect, with the flash of a bright idea — 
“ Mrs. Parkin, your wife, surely doesn’t need that alimony 
very much now." 

“ How’s that?" exclaimed the captain, with sudden 
vigour. 

“ Why, don’t you know? not that she’s the big actress, 
Ethel Nevvcome? That’s her! She’s an immense success, 
and getting pots of money!" 

“By the Lord!" exclaimed Parkin, promptly pouring 
himself another glass of sherry, and rising to his feet. “ 1 
must see about it. I’ll leave my address ’’ — which he pen- 
cilled on a card — “ and if your father can manage fifty, I 
shall be obliged. And, by the way, where does she live — 
Miss Ethel Newcome or Mrs. Parkin? — with her father, I 
suppose?" 

“ Yes; the clergyman. All communications with us are 
made through him." 

“ Oh, indeed. Yes, I daresay." 

Mr. James Slee gave the address; he seemed to know it 
by heart; at any rate, he did not refer to any paper or 
book far it; “No. — , Cheyne AValk, Chelsea;" and then 


A REVEKEKD GENTLEMAN. 


2G9 


Captain Parkin departed, saying he was very glad to have 
met him — very glad, indeed. Presently he put hrs head 
back into the room and asked, “ What theatre?^^ 

“ The Variety, said Slee. 

The captain having found his way out of Basinghall 
Street into Lombard Street, called a hansom, and was 
driven westward. He alighted in the Strand, and went to 
look at the bill of the Variety Theatre. The play was 
“ The School for Scandal, and the name of Miss Ethel 
Newcome opposite that of “ Lady Teazle at once caught 
his eye. He looked at the name “ Ethel,^^ and looked 
again, as if he could fancy his gentle wife’s features behind 
it, and then he turned away, saying to himself: “ By Jove! 
I didn’t think she had it in her! But how the deuce has 
she managed to get into it?” He hung about a little, as if 
half-expecting he might get a glimpse of his wife in char- 
acter, while he watched people in and out of the box-ofhce, 
and thought with bitterness how — if he had not been such 
a condemned fool— all the activity, glory, and profit of this 
might have been shared by him! Presently he crossed the 
street and entered a restaurant to get lunch and to consider 
what he should do. 

His wife an actress! His meek, clinging Ethel a famous 
comedienne! From the first-floor room where he sat he 
could see the front of the theatre with “ Ethel Newcome 
as Lady Teazle ” in great letters. He clasped his hands 
on the table and stared down into the street; but he saw 
nothing of the ceaseless traffic of the Strand. He remem- 
bered the sweet girl who had fled trustingly with him on 
that memorable journey from Wales — whom he had mar- 
ried. Memory flew on to the idle, mad, bad days at Sher- 
borne, after the marriage, on to the scene with his father, 
and the railway journey to London with the woman who 
was not his wife,, on still to his departure from England 
with her, in debt. Where was she now, poor, passionate 
Eleanor? Ah, God! how he had loved! how he had hated 
that woman! How she had been faithful to him as a dog, 
through evil report and good report, living his wild life 
with him all about Europe— helping him to game, helping 
him to cheat, helping him to live anyhow — content if she 
might but drink from his glass and be caressed by him, 
until, in that fatal hour of disgust and gloom in the hot 
Egyptian city, he had turned and told her that she would 


270 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


drive him mad, that he was sick to death of her, and of the 
ruin she was working him! Where was she now, poor 
Eleanor? It was scarcely likely she was still with that at- 
tentive colonel in whose “ protection she had returned to 
England. 

“ Oh, what a fool I"ve been!'' he said to himself. 
“ What a fool! what a predestined fool!" 

It is very true that a fool only perceives the full extent 
of his folly by the entire extent of its punishment. There 
he sat, with his life shattered— -a broken-down roue at 
thirty, and a suspected black-leg. 

But the approach of the waiter with his lunch reminded 
him that in the last event, while a shred of appetite re- 
mained, there was still something to live for so long as a 
red-hot mutton-chop was to be had in England. At the 
same time, the return of his cough reminded him that he 
had best be careful both in his eating and in his drinking. 

Over his lunch he made up his mind to make an effort 
to be reconciled to his wife; if he could accomplish a recon- 
ciliation, he judged it would be a complete rehabilitation of 
himself socially (and he was not now too proud to owe that 
to his wife), and a full restoration to his father's favour. 
“ And we shall kill the fatted veal," he thought as he fin- 
ished his chop, and his spirits rose with the whisky and 
water he swallowed, “ and we shall dwell in the land, and 
verily be good and prosperous until the end." But he 
would not approach Ethel immediately; it might perhaps 
prove politic to make the first move through the old rascal 
her father; but in the meantime he would certainly go 
that very evening to the theatre and see how she looked on 
the stage, “ though I'm nearly stone-broke," he said to 
himself, pulling from his pocket some silver and a sov- 
ereign or two. 

He crossed to the theatre and engaged a stall for that 
evening. There were only end and back seats to be had, 
but that suited him very well, for he did not wish reckless- 
ly to run the risk of premature discovery. Then he re- 
turned to the modest lodging he had hired in Bloomsbury 
on his first returning to. London a day or two before, lei- 
surely and carefully dressed himself (not forgetting to ex- 
ercise a little the art of “ make-up " which he had learned 
abroad), and went out. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


271 


CHAPTEE XLIII. 

TERROR-STRICKEN. 

After a spare dinner — spare because he had to count 
the cost — Jack went to the theatre, and found himself the 
first-comer in the stalls. The pit, however, behind him 
was already well filled, and while he waited he amused 
himself by listening to such remarks as travelled over the 
partition (his seat was in the back row). He was reward- 
ed by hearing something that remotely concerned himself. 

“ Miss Hewcome!’’ sneered an accustomed pitite to one 
evidently much less accustomed. “ You donT think that^s 
her name, do ye? No more ‘ Miss ’ than my mother. 
How do 1 know? A friend o^ mine, wot’s on the stage, 
played with her in the provinces, and her guv^nor — a rum 
chap, as calls himself a parson — was always standin’ drinks; 
the girPs money, you bet. Was he a parson? What for 
should he be a parson when his girPs been on the stage 
ever sin^ she was a kid? Well, her real name’s Mrs. Par- 
kins. No; not Parkins and Gotto. Nobody has ever seen 
him. Bless ye, them actresses are always gettin’ on with 
some bloke or other, afore they know what they’re about, 
and then they chuck ’ini up. Ah, now; see that swell 
cove jes’ come in? That’s Oholmley, Esquire, Q. 0., M. 
P., I heard him make a speech at the ’Ammersmith Town 
’All, pitchin’ into old Gladstone — a tip- topper.” 

Parkin looked at the eminent personage, who was almost 
as early an arrival as himself, but he had no sort of pre- 
monition of the intimate contact into which he was soon to 
come with that very frank and gentle-looking lawyer of 
six foot three, who seemed not to have temper enough to 
“ pitch into ” anybody. 

When the curtain rose he waited impatiently all through 
the brilliant first act for Lady Teazle’s appearance; he had 
forgotten a little the order of the play. When the second 
act opened with Sir Peter’s “ Lady Teazle, Lady Teazle, 
I’ll not bear it!” he was taken by surprise, and when Lady 
Teazle — young, sparkling, careless, beautiful — ^^was greeted 
with a storm of applause, he sat quite still, while his heart 
beat wildly, and he kept exclaiming in thought, “ Can that 
be my wife? Can that be my Ethel? That proud, self- 


272 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


possessed, fascinating woman the same as the shy, humble, 
loving girl 1 knew! Richer, now, too, in voice, as in dress 
and figure What a treasure he had lost! What a pre- 
cious pearl — his own — he had stupidly neglected and 
turned away from! In that hour Captain Parkin thought 
less of himself and more humbly of his own perceptions 
than he had ever done before, fie was more truly in love 
with his wife now than he had ever been, and the more 
skittish and scornful she seemed as the action of the play 
progressed, the more enthralled he became, and the more 
resolved to win her back, cost what humiliation of himself 
it might. The height of his feeling was reached in her 
famous scene with Joseph Surface, when he had an access 
of jealousy, sharp and wild, which astonished himself — and 
no wonder, for the irreproachable Joseph was pla 5 ^ed that 
night by one of the finest actors of our generation — the 
only actor, since Jack Palmer, who has been able to make 
Joseph Surface appear the hero of “ The School for Scaii- 
dal.^^ 

He left the theatre resolved to make approaches to his 
wife at once. Upon conclusion, however, he reverted to 
liis former intention: he would try to win over Merrydew 
first. Next evening, when he was sure his wife would be 
gone to the theatre, he approached the house on Cheyne 
Walk, and rang the bell. He asked for Mr. Merrydew. 

Mr. Merrydew, the maid said, was gone to his club, she be- 
lieved. “ Ah, did she know what club it was?^^ “Oh, 
yes, the Hyacinth, in Piccadilly.'’^ Fifteen minutes’ ride 
Jn a hansom, and he was at the door of the club. He ran 
up the steps, and inquired of the hall-porter for Mr. Merry- 
dew; was he in the club? The porter looked in his book, 
said yes, and gave the card — on which was engraved “ Cap- 
tain Parkin ” — to the boy in buttons. The boy showed the 
captain into the visitors’ room, and departed to seek Mr. 
Merrydew. He found him in the smoking-room, enjoying 
the seductive charms of a cigar and a French novel. He 
presented the card on his tray. 

“Eh? Who?” said Mr. Merrydew, taking it up. “ Bless 
me! Yes— yes. Where is he?” he asked, and looked about 
as if he expected his terrible visitor to be at the boy’s heel. 

“ In the guests’ room, sir,” said the boy. 

For an instant the panic thought of flight seized him.'M 
“Did you say I was in? Well, never mind. ITlcome'^ 


A REVEREKD GE^TTLEMAI^-. 273 

down/^ He saw that running away, though it might put 
off, would not banish entirely the evil day. 

He rose to go. He put back the novel on the book- 
rack, but kept his cigar between his fingers. “ It will look 
easier,’^ he thought. As he opened the door to pass out he 
found his presence of mind vanishing; he observed quite 
irrelevantly that a letter with a penny on the corner lay on 
the letter-box on the side-table; he wondered who had writ- 
ten the letter, and thought he had never before seen that 
fashion of requesting the “favour of a stamp. Ashe 
turned to descend the wide, rich-carpeted stairs, with leaden 
feet, he had rapidly dissolving views of policemen and 
gaols, and judges and juries, and courts of law with crowd- 
ed galleries. Where the stairs turned he lingered a little. 
He almost resolved to throw himself upon Jack’s mercy. 
He continued his descent, and as his eye took in the whole 
extent of the ample hall, and told him there was not even 
a policeman yet in waiting, courage — what of it he ever 
had — returned in a shallow flood. “ I must put Kate up 
to it,” he thought. “I may get out of it yet.” When 
he reached the hall he glanced at the door of the room 
where Captain Parkin lay in wait, but he walked across 
to the hall-porter. 

“ Where,” he asked, “ is the gentleman that wants to 
see me? Oh, yes; in the visitors’ room; that one; yes.” 

But not even yet did he go straight to the door; he went 
off another way to arrange himself first, and to see if he 
looked very pale. At length he went to the dreadful door, 
bravely turned the handle, and entered. 

“ Excuse my keeping you waiting. Jack,” he said, while 
he glanced furtively round the room to make sure that 
Captain Parkin was not accompanied by any executant of 
the law. “ I— I hope you’re pretty well?” 

“ I am very ill, Merrydew,” said Jack, pensively, and 
broke into a dismal, hacking cough. 

“ And there’s no fire in this room! Will you come into 
the smoking-room, or into the drawing-room?” he said; 
for the quick thought encouraged him that a sick man can 
not show much anger, and that his resenting might be ap- 
peased by courteous treatment. 

He helped Jack to hang up his hat and coat, and in 
doing so tried to divine from his manner how much exactly 
he knew of the actual state of affairs. He noticed how 


274 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


changed he was, how very much older he looked, and con- 
sidering it, he concluded that the husband could scarcely 
be surprised to find the wife changed, too. “ Kate can 
carry it off, if she only will,’ ^ he assured himself again. 
He found a warm corner by one of the smoking-room fires, 
and when they were seated in capacious easy-chairs (in 
which they might almost go to bed), with a little table be- 
tween them bearing cigarettes and liquors, they looked ex- 
tremely comfortable: frequenters of the room, noting the 
stranger and Merrydew^s eager and impressive manner 
towards him, thought that “ Old Shandy (or “ Shandy- 
gaff;^'’ he was known by both nick-names among the irrev- 
erent youth of the club) was entertaining a very dear and 
exalted friend. In spite, however, of the apparent com- 
fort of his seat, Merrydew was on thorns for some time, till 
Jack Parkin, warmed by a generous drink, disclosed the 
purpose of his visit. He said he had just arrived in Lon- 
don from the East — sick of himself, sick of it all. He 
made it clear that he had been alone for some time. 

“ I made up my mind,^’ said he, “ to come home and 
try to put things straight. I travelled right away from 
Constantinople. I’ve had a damnable six years of it, 
Merrydew— since you wrote to say Ethel didn’t want to see 
me any more. I suppose she never says anything about 
me?” 

“ N — no,” faltered Merrydew, “ not that I have heard. ” 

“ I saw her last night on the stage: I didn’t know she 
was an actress till young Slee told me yesterday. You 
know the Slees, of course?” 

“ Yes, I know them.” And Merrydew most heartily 
consigned them to the limbo of babbling fools — at the same 
time as he quieted the most urgent of his apprehensions by 
Jack’s admission that he believed he had seen his wife. 

“ Look here, Merrydew; 1 came back to seek her out, 
and to ask her to let bygones be bygones.” 

“ ‘ Let the dead past bury its dead,’ ” quoted Merrydew, 
thoughtfully, beginning to perceive how matters were tend- 
ing. 

“ Exactly,” said Jack. “ She was always a kind, for- 
giving little soul, and I thought if she would bring herself 
to be my wife again, everything would be even better than 
it was before — for I’m not the young fool I was then — and 
my father would come round again, too. 1 intended to go 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


275 


straight to her, and hear what she would say to me. But 
by G — d! Merrydew, when I saw her last night — how clever 
she was! (1 never thought she had anything of that sort 
in her) and how handsome! — I began to think she would 
not give twopence to see me again! and, by Jove, 1 con- 
fess, though I felt more in love with hef than ever, I 
couldn^t go straight away and speak to her. Now, you 
see, that^s why Fve found you out to ask your help in the 
business; I suppose you won^t refuse it?’’ 

“ No, certainly not. Nothing would give me greater 
pleasure than to promote a good understanding — without 
recrimination, without reminders of the past, which, God 
help us! none of us — no, none of us — can undo! D’you 
remember. Jack,” said he, taking his glass from the little 
table, “ how we drank when you first appeared among us 
in Wales to ‘ a good understanding all round ’? Here’s to 
it again,” said he, nodding to Jack, and draining off his 
liquor. “ Ah, me^ — well. But you have done the best 
thing you could do in coming to me first. I — I shall do 
what I can.” 

“ And the service,” said Jack, with a meaning glance, 
“ won’t be forgotten. The governor was always very fond 
of her, and I’m sure he’d be ready to — to go to any length 
to show his appreciation of any one that had helped to 
bring us together again.” 

“ Oh, no matter for that,” said Merrydew, helping him- 
self again to the generous liquor. But you were wise to 
hold back a little. I shall bring the thing before her gently 
and gradually, you know. I shall remind her of other 
(lays, and bring her to think of you pleasantly and regret- 
fully, almost of her own accord, you see. Yes — that’s the 
way.” 

“Yes,” said Jack, “ 1 believe you’re right. Now — 
when do you think the matter will be sufldciently en 
train f” 

“ Well, say this: suppose you meet me here this night 
week?” 

“ Isn’t that a long time?” said Jack. 

“ Not for the purpose, I think,” said Merrydew. “ But 
I’m here almost every night; suppose you look in here on 
Monday.” 

So it was settled, and in a little while, when the liquor 
was finished, they parted. 


276 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


CHAPTER XLIV. 

OUT OF THE MOUTH OF BABES. 

It had come at last — the great crisis! The agreeable 
fowls which our reverend gentleman had hatched and 
reared were coming “ home to roost. What was an easy, 
respectable jidneur like him to do? He had not now — 
what with satiety of one sort and another — even the des- 
perate need of six years ago to nerve him; the shock of the 
crisis impinging upon him at various points reduced him 
to a condition utterly gelatinous. All sinners will feel for 
him: for his, I believe, is a common experience. 

There was but one straight gate — one narrow way — of 
escape from the discovery and disgrace that threatened to 
overwhelm him; that he saw clearly enough: to prevail 
upon Kate, namely, to maintain the fiction that she was 
Mrs. Parkin, and to accept the conditions which the fiction 
entailed — either agree, that is, to Jack Parkin’s proposal 
of partnership, which, of course, was impossible, and wdiich 
any way involved mention of the alimony, or else be con- 
tent to remain single so long as Jack Parkin lived, which 
also seemed impossible, considering the understanding be- 
tween Kate and Cholmley. The conditions then being on 
the face of them unacceptable, where was the advantage of 
mentioning the matter to Kate at all? Indeed, if he even 
announced that he had seen Jack Parkin, might not Kate, 
in her present state of feeling, at once seek to disclose her 
identity to him, and to come to an understanding about 
the retention of the child? No; that narrow way was 
much too dangerous, much too steep to be attempted. 

In debating this, and in stating the result to himself 
over and over again, Merrydew spent the days till Monday 
— Monday, and he had to meet Jack Parkin that evening! 
He had nothing to say to him, he had not even yet invent- 
ed an excuse for having nothing to say. He thought he 
would WTite a note to the club to be handed to Jack when 
he called, saying that he was not well enough to come out, 
but he didn’t do it. He went out upon the Embankment 
to see if a better idea would visit him there. He hung 
about, fatuous and inert, in the spring sunshine, which 
was just beginning to be warm, and thought how sweet the 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


277 


sunshine would be if it were not for this. He gave nis at- 
tention to the penny steamboats rushing up and down the 
river, and to the slow barges moving with the tide, and 
then with a shiver of recollection withdrew it, and said to 
himself, “Yes; but let me see now; let me see.'’^ Yet 
nothing came of it. After lunch he said to himself, “ 1 
had better send a telegram; that will look more as if I had 
hoped up till the last moment that I would see him.^^ Still 
hoping, however, to think of something else, he went into 
Battersea Park. Fatuous and inert, he wandered up and 
down, sat upon sheltered benches, looked at the ducks, at 
the children, at the nurse-maids. Evening came, and not 
even a telegram was sent. “ Let him just suppose/^ he 
said to himself, “ that 1 was detained somehow. Sending 
letters and telegrams makes the suggested meeting look 
too important.^’ What would he have thought of its im- 
portance had he been long-sighted and keen-sighted enough 
when he was sitting on one side of the water in Battersea 
Park to have seen Jack Parkin on the other side in con- 
versation with little Ethel and her maid? 

Captain Parkin, when the exaltation of his interview 
with Merrydew had sunk, recalled with envy the prodigal 
comfort in which his wife’s father seemed to live, and 
thought with suspicion of the anxious amiability of his be- 
haviour. All the good things the parson enjoyed were 
doubtless derived from his daughter: why then should he, 
with so much apparent eagerness, welcome another to share 
them, perhaps to appropriate them altogether? He had 
not been wont to be distinguished by generosity, or self- 
abnegation. The more Jack thought of it, the more he 
became involved in the suspicion that Merrydew was play- 
ing, or trying to play, a game: he had readily and smooth- 
ly given a promise which he intended to break: he had no 
intention to lead his daughter to think with kindness and 
forgiveness of her husband; if he mentioned him at all he 
would probably call him, “ that blackguard Parkin 
that. Jack believed, was the turn of Merrydew’s “ little 
game.” He, therefore, resolved not to trust to his good 
offices altogether; he would, of course, meet him at the 
time appointed, but in the meantime he would prepare to 
act for himself. 

His first preparation was to go and have a look at the 
house in Cheyne Walk. He spied a little girl at one of the 


278 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


windows. No doubt it was the child, his own daughler 
whom he had never seen; the child, it was likely, would be 
frequently taken for a walk, by a maid, probably; he was 
a fool if he could not strike up an acquaintance with both, 
and find it of some advantage. He paced up and down 
the Embankment a little, with his eye on the house; then, 
in order to have the door more steadily in view, he ascend- 
ed and stood on the suspension bridge. It was that early 
hour in the afternoon when children and nurse-maids most 
do take the air. His hope was soon fulfilled: he saw little 
girl and maid leave the house together, and come towards 
the bridge. They passed him, and a new sensation thrilled 
him at sight of the cliild: she was so like what he con- 
ceived he must himself have been at her age. He smiled 
to see, too, that her manner was of the masterful kind: the 
bright, coquettish maid-servant was rather in her company, 
than she in the maid^s. He followed them over the bridge 
and into Battersea Park. The maid soon observed there 
was a gentleman taking note of her, and she began to play 
off foolish little airs, and to skip about and play with the 
child; finally, she sat upon a bench, saying, “ Ihn tired; 
Ethel, you naughty girl, you’ll make yourself so hot.” 

“ You’ve been enjoying yourself,” said Jack, sitting also 
on the bench. The maid turned, and with maidenly sim- 
plicity, looked as if she noticed the gentleman for the first 
time; she smiled, and said nothing. But Jack understood 
her feminine ways, and was preparing with a judicious 
compliment or two to captivate her, when the little girl 
ran up to hear what was passing. She leaned against her 
maid, and stared at the strange gentleman. 

“ Well, little sweetheart,” said Jack, “ what’s your 
name?” The child glanced at her nurse, and stared at 
him again. 

‘‘ Don’t be rude,” said the maid; “ tell the gentleman 
your name, dear,” 

“ Never mind,” said Jack, “ I know it without heins 
told. It’s Ethel.” ^ 

“ You just heard Jane call me,” said the child; “ that’s 
how you know.” 

“ Oh, but,” said Jack, “ I know more than that; 1 
know that your whole name is Ethel Parkin. I know a 
great many things without being told: I’m a magician 
come from the EusL” 


A KEYIEEEND GENTLEMAK. 


279 


The child gazed a moment at his dark, somewhat sallow 
face, and his keen eyes. She was evidently inclined to be- 
lieve the fascinating declaration, but she asserted her in- 
credulity: “ You’re not!” 

“ Don’t be rude, dear,” mildly remonstrated the maid. 

“ Oh, yes, I am,” said Jack. “ 1 know a great many 
things. I know that you are, let me see, nearly six years 
and a half old; that you live in No. — , Oheyne Walk — ” 

“ Oh, you do know things!” exclaimed the maid. 
‘‘You come to the house on Sunday evenin’s, I dessay.” 

“ Never been in the house in my life,” said Jack. Then 
again addressing the child: “ I know, too, that your grand- 
father’s name is Mr. Merrydew, and. he lives in the same 
house with you; and that your mama’s name is the same 
as yours — Ethel.” 

“ Ob, no, it’s not! — no, it’s not!” exclaimed the child; 
the magician had blundered. “ It’s not Ethel, it’s Kate! 
I’ve heard grandpa call her!” 

Jack paused: the magician from the East was puzzled. 
“ Magicians sometimes do make mistakes, but I don’t 
think I’ve made one,” said he. 

“ Oh, yes, you have, sir,” said the maid, smiling; “ I’ve 
’card master say ‘ Kate ’ to missus.” 

“ Then,” asked Jack, “ how many missuses have you?” 

“ Only one, sir.” 

“ Why, then, where’s the other? Do you mean there’s 
only one lady in the house?” 

“ That’s all, sir.” 

“ And she acts at the theatre?” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“ By Jove! And — and, where’s her sister, then?” 

“ Never ’card of any sister, sir.” 

Here the child broke in again, interested in the magi- 
cian’s evident disaiDpointment that he did not know every- 
thing: “ Oh, yes, ma told me I had another ma once; 

’ ■ * ’ ’ ’ ig ago— gone to heaven— and 



The magician looked all round, put his hand to his head, 
looked a moment or two on the ground, and then made 
the maid jump with the fierce demand, “ What’s your 
mistress’s name?” 

“ Mrs. Parkin, of course, sir,” said the maid, promptly; 
^ though it’s Ethel— Ethel Newcome at the theatre,” 


280 


A KEVEREifD GENTLEMAN. 


He could not linger: he had the presence of mind to say 
a civil “ good-bye to the maid and little Ethel, and then 
he strode away. 

So with a puff of a child's breath collapsed Merrydew's 
house of cards. 

Jack had not gone far, spreading out to himself the 
meaning of what he had heard, when he thought he might 
hav^e learned more. He stopped and turned, but neither 
maid nor child was to be seen. That was Friday after- 
noon, there would probably be no chance of seeing them 
again until Monday, Saturday and Sunday being “ popu- 
lar " days in the park. 

Jack Parkin was no fool, intellectually, as we know. He 
did not need to study long what he had heard to perceive 
that he had been the victim of a most nefarious conspiracy, 
in which clearly both Merrydew and his daughter Kate 
were concerned. Supposing his wife was dead — and he 
would soon assure himself of that — what had been the ob- 
ject of keeping her death secret from him? What, of 
course, what? but the appropriation of the three hundred 
pounds, which all these years had been deducted from his 
proper allowance — presumedly for the maintenance of his 
wife and child — while he had been living from hand to 
mouth, a life of unrest, of suspicion, of danger! Great 
heavens! When he thought of it, he clinched his fist, 
ground his teeth, and declared to himself, “ By G — d! I’ll 
squeeze them for it. On the money they’ve got by false 
pretences and forgery — forgery. I’ll bet! though I must 
find out — the old sinner has fattened, and ehe"^ has made 
herself what she is, and all the time I’m this By G — d! 
it’s enough to make me shed tears of blood for* myself. 
But I’ll squeeze them to a pulp.” 

Thus in the solitude of his Bloomsbury lodging he com- 
muned with himself, and the more he thought of it all, 
and of himself, broken in health and alone, the madder he 
became, and the fiercer grew his vindictiveness. But he 
did not long “ unpack ” his “ heart with words,” he be- 
stirred himself to bring his suspicions to the test of proof. 
He descended to the street and called a cab, to drive to 
Percy Circus; he had a very vivid recollection of the stormy 
scene he had had with Kate there, and he believed if Ethel 
was dead it must have been there she died. He saw the 
little old lady he remembered having seen before, and she 


A KEVEHEND GEi^TLEMAN. 


281 


answered his questions quite simply, knowing no reason 
for concealment. Mr. and Miss Merrydew had lived there 
—very nice people — she came sometimes to call now, 
though not often; to be sure there was another daughter, 
who had had a baby there, and who had died, and been 
buried from there; poor thing, she had seen great trouble. 

That, surely, was confirmation enough of his suspicion; 
still, to make assurance doubly sure, he would get a copy, 
if it was to be had, of the registration of death. It was 
then too late for that, so ho put it off till next day, and 
went to his lodgings to dress for the theatre; he meant to 
have another look at Miss Ethel Newcome. He sat in the 
stalls, but farther forward than when he was there two 
evenings before. Being less embarrassed with preconcep- 
tions than before, he was able to note better all the attrac- 
tions of the actress and her acting. He thought how ab- 
surd of him it had been to believe that his Ethel could 
have developed into that. As he sat and watched her 
movements and heard her voice, he was amused at the 
change effected in his own feeling since he had seen her be- 
fore; two nights ago he was prepared to be that woman's 
humble vassal, if she would but smile upon him; to-night 
he exulted in the fact that he held her fate in the hollow of 
his hand (at least, he would hold it to-morrow); all these 
men around and above him were probably, each in his way, 
admirers and desirers of her, but he alone would be able 
to say “ come " and “ go:" he was completely master of 
the situation. As he revelled in the thought of his power, 
and gloated in the anticipation of its exercise, and as he 
more and more expited his faculties with “ refreshment " 
between the acts, a complete delightful scheme of revenge 
rose before his palpitating vision; she had six years before 
threatened to be a second mother to his child, she now 
called herself Mrs. Parkin — “ And, by Jove! she shall be!" 

In palliation of this horrible threat there is little to urge, 
except from the young man's point of view, which was cer- 
tainly not a lofty one; he told himself that he had been 
scandalously ill-used, and that the woman was— well, was 
an actress. 

Next day he went to Somerset House and procured a 
copy of the “registration of death" of Ethel Parkin. 
The date told him that she must have died about the time 
of his visit to Percy Circus. Then a short visit to Sl-.i , 


282 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


ostensibly to thank him for his advance of fifty pounds, 
really to learn how the receipts for the alimony were 
signed. That he managed without exciting suspicion, and 
then his case against Merrydew was complete. 

On Monday afternoon he revisited Battersea Park, with 
a box of chocolates in his pocket for his daughter if he 
should see her, though he had nothing now of value to 
learn. He met her and her maid, as 1 have elsewhere 
hinted, and made himself very agreeable to both. In the 
evening he called at the Hyacinth Club to see Merrydew. 
Merrydew was not there. 

“ He does not intend to come,^^ said Jack to himself. 
“ Then 1 must go to him. Morning will be best to find 
them both together.’^ 


CHAPTER XLV. 

THE CAt>TAIN'S STRATEGY. 

On Tuesday morning Merrydew at length had an idea: 
his gelatinous condition of mind had suddenly disappeared; 
it had solidified and articulated itself round an active point 
of life — he would tell Jack Parkin when he should see him 
on Wednesday that he had pled his cause with his wife from 
point to point — from indirect to direct entreaty — and she 
absolutely refused to have anything to say to him; she 
would sooner give up the greater part (perhaps he had bet- 
ter say the whole) of the alimony than see him again. To 
get the two or three hundred a year back, he thought, 
would be sure to satisfy Jack, in spite of his sentimental 
protestations about renewed love. 

Merrydew therefore at lunch, with his characteristic easy 
hopefulness that all would yet be well, was in better spirits 
than usual, and Kate was glad of it, for it was a very 
special occasion. Walter Cholmley had come in, and she 
had delayed her answer to his momentous question till she 
was ashamed, because while her father looked so preoccu- 
pied and worried she had foreborne to ask his permission 
to tell Walter their common secret; now, she thought, 
would be her opportunity when his care seemed banished. 

Thus, they entered the drawing - room after lunch. 
Merrydew, not to be an interruptive third person between 
his daughter and her lover, withdrew to the back drawing- 
room, where he found, seated in an easy-chair, his grand' 


A REVEREl!fD GENTLEMAN. 2S3 

child, in a somewhat touzled condition, and with a little 
box in her lap. 

“ What?’^ said he, cheerfully. “ Is the spoiled infant 
in arms again 

“I’m not,'^ said his granddaughter, haughtily, “ an in- 
fant in arms.^^ 

“ No, no, my dear, of course youh-e not; you^re much 
too big for that — but not too big to have a doll — eh? N(, 
not a doll,’"’ said he, looking closer. “ What is it you^e 
got there, child 

“ Something,'^ said the child, tucking it into her pina- 
fore. “ I shall run away. Everybody's nasty and unkind 
to me here.'^ 

“ Oh. And that box, I presume,^^ said the amused 
grandfather, “ is to carry your personal property. 

“ No, it^s not, grandpa. Ik’s a present from the gentle- 
man I shall go to. I love him, and I don^t love you. He 
told me heM love me very much, and buy me everything I 
liked, if I would be his little girl.^’ 

“ Dear me! That, I fear, is what they all say.” 

“ He said would I like him for a father, and he wrote 
on it, ‘ To my daughter, from the Magician of the 
East.^ 

“ Wrote on what? This is getting interesting, my 
dear. ” 

“ On this box,^' said the child, still keeping it covered 
with her pinafore. 

“ Let me see. Come — yes, please let me see,^' urged 
her grandfather. 

“ Don’t take my chot’Iate creams, then,” said she, put- 
ting the box into his hand. 

But Merrydew did not answer; he was busy with his 
glasses and his fancy making out the writing on the bot- 
tom of the box. He did not recognize the hand, but it 
gave him a queer turn. He was poring on it when Kate, 
flushed and eager, came from the next room. 

“ Father,” said she, in a low voice, without pausing to 
look at him, “ please let me tell Walter all about it!” Her 
father did not answer; she looked at him. “ Why, what’s 
the matter, dear?” 

“Nothing, my dear, nothing. Only,” he weakly de- 
plored, “ a man" is no sooner the victim of one worry than 
half a dozen come in upon him, like a pack of duns!” 


284 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


Kate was about to speak, when the maid entered, with 
something of a look of mystery, and said to Merrydew, 
“ Captain Parkin, sir, wishes to see you. That, I think, 
was the name, sir/^ 

“ Oh, yes, that^s the name,’^ said Merrydew. “ I 
thought there was something coming. I felt so well at 
lunch. Where — where is he?'* 

“I showed him into the library, sir." And the maid 
departed. 

As soon as she heard the name “ Parkin," Kate thought 
her deliverance was at hand. She would see him (the 
thought of that had no such effect as it had six years be- 
fore; the experience of those years had destroyed her fear 
of men. ) She would frankly confess what she had done to 
keep the child as she had promised her sister, and she would 
prevail upon him — surely, she would prevail — to let the 
child, who was now as her own, remain still with her. 
This resolution formed itself rapidly as her father and the 
maid exchanged words. Therefore, when she saw her 
father's agitation, and suspected that he still would try to 
sustain the fiction, she put her hand on his arm, and said, 
“ Let me see him, father, for you, as I did before." 

“No, no, my dear," said he, putting her by, “you 
can't. At least, I must see him first. And — and, my 
dear, if he should come upstairs, keep up the Mrs. Parkin; 
try this once, my dear, try." 

“ Father," she began, but he was gone; she stood a mo- 
ment or two disappointed and troubled. Little Ethel came 
and wanted to tell her something, but she said, “ Not 
now, dearie; another time. Run and tell Jane to take 
you out." 

She went to Walter and said her father had gone to see 
a rather disagreeable and unexpected visitor. 

In the meanwhile, with some trepidation, Merrydew en- 
tered the library and the presence of Mr. Jack Parkin. A 
glance told him he was somehow a different Jack from the 
humble gentleman he had conversed with a few days be- 
fore, but yet he greeted him as if he were the same. 

“Ah, Jack, my boy," he began, “sorry I was not 
able — " but Jack interrupted him. 

“ That will do, father-in-law. You’d better sit down, 
you're not very well, 1 think. I suppose you were not very 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


285 


well last night; very likely you have not been very well 
since you saw me. 

He closed the door, and thus took possession of Merry- 
dew, and kept it. Merrydew suddenly, trembling and 
pale, subsided into a chair by the table, while he utered a 
faint, “ Wha — what d'ye mean?" 

“ You've been busy interceding for me with my wife, 
haven't you?" said Jack, taking position on the hearth- 
rug (if you are about to call a man ugly names, and other- 
wise humiliate him, you cannot well do it sitting on the 
other side of the table from him — unless the table should 
happen to be a very wide one). 

“We — ell, 1," faltered Merrydew; he was stopped by 
the cold, critical look in Jack's eyes, which suggested that 
he had been in a violent passion but had got over the heat 
of it. 

“You old rascal!" said Jack, slowly shaking his head, 
while he seemed to search Merrydew through and through 
with his eyes. 

Merrydew was thrown into a terrible quandary — he felt 
danger, disgrace, destruction present, but he did not know 
from what point they were to spring upon him. 

“ 'Pon my word. Jack," he feebly began again, when he 
observed Jack's fingers inserted in his waistcoat pocket, 
and he paused to wildly fancy what that could be for. “ If 
you would only," he continued. 

“ There!" said Jack. “I'll put you out of your mis- 
ery. " 

From his waistcoat pocket he drew and unfolded a slip 
of paper, which he spread before Merrydew. It was the 
copy of the “ registration of death " of Ethel Parkin. 
Merrydew looked, and understood he was lost; his mind 
was caught in a desperate whirl of panic; he had nothing 
to say. Jack Parkin turned in shame and contempt, and 
poked the fire. 

“ Well," said he, returning, “ have you nothing to say? 
Not a word? Is that genuine?" Merrydew weakly nod- 
ded in assent. “ Very well," said Jack, and paused. 

“ What," at length said Merrydew, feeling the terror 
upon him of policemen, and cells, and courts of law, 
“ what are you going to do?" 

“ Ah," said Jack, “ now we can talk. Of course, you 


286 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


know the consequences of obtaining money by false pre- 
tences — by forgery — for six years and a half 

“ DonH be so loud/^ said Merrydew, glancing at the 
door. “ Of course, I know — if you— you bring a case 
against me. 

“You know you have had about two thousand pounds 
of my money. 

“ I know — I know. But why need we go into details?’’ 

“ I should like you,” said Jack, “ if 1 should take it into 
my head not to prosecute— I should like you to understand 
what you’re delivered from.” 

“ I should understand that perfectly. Jack — I — I assure 
you. And you won’t prosecute?” He fastened tenaciously 
on that plank of escape. 

“ Well,” said Jack, observing him, “ that depends. In 
the meantime, will you be good enough to take me to your 
partner in this — your daughter?” 

“ 1 should be very much obliged. Jack,” said he, “ if 
you would tell me distinctly whether you intend to prose- 
cute; it would relieve me immensely, and let me be fit to 
introduce you into the presence of my daughter.” Jack 
steadily looked at him, but said nothing. “ Prosecution,” 
urged Merrydew, “ would be a miserable revenge. It 
would be a scandal for you, as well as for me.” 

“ Yes,” said Jack, “ I think 1 can do better than prose- 
cute.” 

“ Thank you. Jack — thank you!” said Merrydew, with 
prompt fervour. At once he began to recover his spirits. 
“ And really,” he said, “ 1 have suffered enough through 
it already. We commenced having it when 1 didn’t know 
where to turn for a shilling to get bread and butter; when 
we were wretchedly poor. Since that, of course, I’d have 
given it up, but I didn’t see how; it kept coming month 
by month, and I couldn’t stop it. And it has done me no 
good— not a bit of good; it has gone, I don’t know how.” 

“ Yes,” said Jack, “ I can quite believe it. Well, I won’t 
prosecute — on one or two trifling conditions. First, you 
must ask me to stay here for a week or two; we’ll reckon 
that done — thank you. Then you must be my friend; you 
must back me up in everything. Kow you must take me 
to Kate.” 

“ Y^'es, Jack,” said he, moving slowly towards the door. 
“ I must really mention one thing ” — and he returned a 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


287 


step — “ Kate knows nothing about the alimony — has 
known nothing of it from the beginning. 

“ Oh,^^ said Jack. He saw at once, if that were true, 
he would need to redress his ideas of Kate to some extent. 
“ But,^' said he, sharply, “ where did she think, then, you 
got tlie money to keep you both?^’ 

“ I — I contributed to the newspapers,^^ said Merrydew, 
shyly, “ and she thought I did more than I did.^' 

Jack looked at him a moment, and then broke into a 
laugh. “ Well!^^ he exclaimed, “the lies you have told 
and acted in your time!^^ 

Merrydew, with a show of recklessness, joined in the 
laugh, and felt that now he might throw off fear of conse- 
quences. “ You^ll say nothing, then,’^ said he, “ before 
her about the alimony 

He led the way out of the room and upstairs. About 
half-way he suddenly stopped, and turned. 

“ Oh, begad he exclaimed. “ I forgot Cholmley was 
with her. 

“ Cholmley? Cholmley?^’ said Jack, reflectively. “ Ah — 
Cholmley, Esqiiire, Q.C., M.P. 

“ Yes,^^ answered Merrydew. “.Do you know him?^’ 

“ Tve seen him,^’ said Jack. “ Go on. 

“ Strange,’^ said Merrydew, continuing the ascent with 
less alacrity, “ that he should never have mentioned it. 
H^m.^^ 

Summoning all his fortitude, he opened the drawing- 
room door, and advanced firmly. 

“ Fve brought up Captain Parkin to see you, my dear,’^ 
he said, and stopped to let Jack come forward. 

Kate and Cholmley rose together, one from either side 
of the fire, and Kate advanced with a constrained and 
somewhat scared look. She gave, however, a firm enough 
hand to Parkin, and said coldly, “ How d’ye do?” and 
then, as a matter of form, turned and introduced him to 
her companion, “ Captain Parkin — Mr. Cholmley.” 

The two men bowed, and had a searching look into each 
other’s eyes. “ He’s her lover,” thought Jack. “ He 
means mischief,” thought Cholmley. 

Parkin felt a trifle nervous about the part he contem- 
plated playing towards this sumptuous woman, yet he 
seemed as cool as a gambler. There was an awkward 
pause for an instant, when Cholmley relieved it by saying 


288 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


to Kate, “ I must go.^" He bowed again to Parkin, said 
“ Good-bye to Merrydew, and was accompanied by Kate 
to the door. 

“ Come again soon,^^ said Kate, while her hand was in 
his. 

He retained the hand a moment longer, and considered 
her disturbed manner. “ Tell me, Kate,” said he; “ is 
he likelv to give you trouble? You said he was a disagree- 
able visitor.” 

• “ Oh, no,” said Kate, hurriedly, “ no. But I shall tell 
you when you come. Good-bye.” She returned into the 
room. As she passed her father she whispered, “ It’s im- 
possible to keep up the name!” 

Parkin broke into his dismal cough. Kate sat down op- 
posite to him. 

“ You find, I suppose,” said she — she must say some- 
thing — “ England very severe now, just come from abroad. 
You have just come — haven’t you?” 

“ 1 came back,” said he, “a week ago, my dear.” 

The concluding vocative — “ my dear ” — stung both 
Kate and her father like a shot. But what precisely was its 
meaning? Kate looked at him; he was gazing into the 
fire. Perhaps he only meant it in a brotherly way; she 
would wait. 

“ 1 came straight from Egypt,” he said, “ where I had 
gone to be a volunteer with the Gordon Expedition. I have 
been ill; I’m not well now, and your father has kindly 
asked me to come here and stay for a week or so to recover 
— but, of course, I must have your permission first.” He 
looked at her with a face full of sad appeal. 

She glanced in some astonishment at her father, who was . 
looking hard at his nails, but she answered with ready 
frankness, “ Certainly; I shall be pleased.” 

“And is that all?” he asked, reproachfully. “You 
didn’t used to be so hard. I have waited years for a word 
from you, saying you forgave me, ever since your father 
wrote to me to say you would not see me again!” 

“Oh! What?” exclaimed Kate, rigid in her chair, 
while she glanced at her father, almost as astonished as 
herself. 

“ I have waited and waited,” Parkin continued, leaning 
forward and gazing at the fire, “ till my heart grew sick. 

] could bear it no longer. I determined to come home, 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


289 


and find yon out!’^ Poor Kate rose swiftly from her chair, 
and stood behind it, trembling in every limb, while her 
bosom heaved tumnltuously. “ 1 came home, and discov- 
ered, to my amazement, that my wife was a great actress. 
Then I was despondent and thought, ‘ With all this whirl 
of excitement she’ll have forgotten the quiet, loving days 
we once had before trouble and temptation came. ’ ” Jack’s 
eyes were now on hers, and she stood as if fascinated, hold- 
ing tightly to the back of her chair. “ I found your fa- 
ther, and asked him to speak for me ” — (Kate darted a 
swift glance of suspicion at her father) — “ but — I — I did 
not hear from him, and now I have come myself. I con- 
fess I wronged you, terribly, but — you are my wife, and 
you will forgive me?” He was silent. 

“This is fearful!” said Kate. “I — 1 am not Ethel! 
Don’t you know? Can’t you see? I never was your wife!” 

“ Then,” he asked, rising, “ where is my wife?” The 
sudden movement brought his cough back. 

“ Good God!” exclaimed Merrydew, who could sit silent 
no longer; but a stern look from Parkin subdued him. 

“ Your wife — Ethel,” said Kate, “ is dead. I am her 
sister Kate. ” 

“ You are called Mrs. Parkin?” said Jack. 

“ Yes,” said Kate, “ yes. Father, I must speak!” 

“ Certainly,” said he, “ speak on, my dear — begad!’ 

“ I think,” she began, “ it never appeared such a very 
wicked thing I had done until now. But we never meant 
to harm or wrong you; 1 only wanted to keep Ethel’s baby 
with me, as I had promised her when she Jay dying, and I 
was afraid — we were afraid — you would want to take it 
from us. I thought you had come for it that day we met 
in Percy Circus.” 

“ And she was dead then?” 

“Yes.” That was news to him. 

“My God!” he exclaimed, recalling again the circum- 
stances, and feeling all that might have been if he had 
known the truth then. “ Not even tell me that! You 
see now what you have done? 1 might have known that 
she, dear girl, would never have held out so long; she was 
always kind and forgiving. You made me think hard 
things of her; you kept my child from me; you made me 
leave the country; and now when I come back, broken 
very much through vou, and sick— ill, seeking forgiveness 


290 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


from my wife and reconciliation, and rest — I am told they 
all went years ago! It is a very fine — very noble venge- 
ance to have worked to the memory of your dear sister!'^ 
Parkings sad plight, and the thought of what he had en- 
dured cleared from Kate’s generous heart all traces of ani- 
mosity. 

“ Forgive me!” she said, wiping her eyes. “ Forgive 
me! It is dreadful! dreadful! And I never guessed it! 
We deserve to be punished! Indeed, we do! But say — 
please — that you will forgive us! And come and stay and 
rest in this house as if it were Ethel’s.” 

With these pathetics Merrydew was very much put out 
and bewildered. He sat frowning and surveying his 
fingers; it was so difficult to tell how much of Jack’s emo- 
tion was feigned and how much genuine. He thought, 
however, he must help to finish the scene. 

“ We did it for the best,” said he, “ God knows. I’m 
sure, Jack will believe that. ” 

” Yes,” said Jack, looking at him very sharply. Then 
turning to Kate, as if with a generous impulse, he said, 
“ You did it out of love for your sister — for Ethel — I have 
no doubt. So, we’ll say no more about it.” 


CHAPTER XLVI. 

“none but the brave.” 

But this apparent harmony did not last very long. 
Kate’s disposition to be lavish in her display of contrition 
for the wrongs she believed she had done against her sis- 
ter’s husband received a rude shock that very evening. It 
was time for her to go to the theatre; she heard a vehicle 
drive up to the door, and thinking it was the cab that reg- 
ularly came for her, she descended. On the stairs she met 
one of the maids carrying a small portmanteau. 

“ What’s that, Mary?” she asked. 

“ Master’s luggage, ma’am,” answered the girl. 

“ Master’s luggage? D’ye mean Mr. Merrydew’s?” 

“ No, ma’am; the capting’s.” 

This revealed such possibilities of suspicion and scandal, 
that Kate was almost moved enough to return upstairs, 
find Captain Parkin, and get him to make a kind of pub- 
lic declaration that he was not her husband. But that 
would be absurd. She satisfied herself, therefore, with 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 291 

saying to the girl, “ Captain Parkin is not ‘ master;’ don’t 
make the mistake again.” 

Tliat evening, too, Merrydevv had his eyes opened to an 
unpleasant vvicUh by the scope of Parkin’s “conditions.” 
Upon his intimating an intention to visit his club, and say- 
ing to his son-in-law, “ Perhaps you will like to stay and 
get yourself straight here,” the young man had answered, 
“ Oh, no; 1 must go with you.” That was very awkward; 
because when they entered the club and Merrydew encoun- 
tered a friend or acquaintance Parkin whispered, “ Intro- 
duce me,” and he had to introduce him~“ Captain 
Parkin.” Then after one or two such bare mentions of 
his name. Parkin said, “ Isn’t that rather shabby? You 
might give me the advantage of my relationship to you. 
You’d better, really, or I shall cry olf my bargain willi 
you.” So Merrydew had to introduce him as “ Captain 
Parkin, my son-in-law.” The result of that may be 
guessed. The word went round — Merrydew felt he could 
hear it — that “ La Newcome was not a widow after all; 
her husband had turned up; that was the man with Old 
Shandy.” Such notoriety could not be long endured, and 
very soon after dinner Merrydew proposed they should go 
home. Jack had no objection; he understood j^erfectly 
his companion’s trouble. But, since it was so early, he 
proposed they should walk. That was another infliction, 
for Merrydew had so habituated himself to cabs, that to 
walk any but the shortest distance, and that along smooth 
flags or on soft carpets or turf, was acute pain. Jack in- 
sisted upon dragging him along the harsh gravelled path in 
Hyde Park, from the Corner to Albert Gate. In the 
course of that pilgrimage Merrydew was induced in heed- 
lessness and heat (for his attention was taken up and his 
temper d-isturbed by his aching feet) to announce certain 
things which it would have been better not to have men- 
tioned— that Cholmley was a very old acquaintance of 
Kate’s; that they had had a mutual attachment in the 
days when Kate was a governess, they had cherished it dur- 
ing the years of their separation; that the house they lived, 
in was Cholmley’s, and Cholmley was only waiting now for 
Kate’s full assent to be married; he was a very fine fellow, 
and deserved, if man ever did deserve, fortune and happi- 
ness. What was the full assent he was waiting for? Why, 
Kate had felt that she must explain who she really was 


292 


A EEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


first, that she was not Mrs. Parkin; of course she would do 
that at once now that he, Mr. Jack Parkin, had come and 
resolved the difficulty. 

“ She had better not,^’ said Jack Parkin, coolly. “ Un- 
derstand that clearly; and give her to understand she had 
better not, if she would not see you prosecuted and found 
guilty of obtaining money by false pretences and by 
forgery.-’^ 

“ Stop a minute,’^ said Merry dew, suddenly halting and 
leaning against the fence to ease his feet, “ 1 can^t go tear- 
ing along at this rate! It seems to me you have a nasty 
vindictive spirit. Jack! yes, doosid vindictive, begad! 
‘ Vindictive ’ is the very word!’ 

“Let me see,” said Jack, standing over against him, 
but looking thoughtfully through the haze towards the 
trees of Kensington Gardens. Perhaps, though, you had 
better not tell her that just yet. But Cholmley must be 
kept away from the house — she must not have the oppor- 
tunity of telling him till my affair’s settled — and then she 
won’t want to.” 

“ ’Pon my word!” exclaimed Merrydew, gazing at him 
in helpless reproach. “ I don’t know what the doose 
you’re driving at! Your affair? What — what d’you 
mean?” 

“ Well,” said Parkin, “I’ll speak plainly. I want your 
daughter to keep the name she has given herself, with all 
its rights and privileges; she shall really be Mrs. Parkin.” 

“ Good God!” 

“ Don’t speak in a hurry. It’s her own fault and yours 
that I am fond of her. I came home expecting to find my 
wife — I have found more beauty and charm than I ex- 
pected, and I am not going to be disappointed.” 

“ You want Kate? and you want me to help you to get 
her? I don’t think you know what you’re talking about, 
young man! Begad, this whole business makes me think 
you must have had a touch of sun-stroke in Egypt!” 

“ You can’t get off on that line, my dear Merrydew,” 
said Jack, shaking his head. 

“ Why, if I were inclined to play Pandarus I might have 
led her to nobler tents than yours, captain, let me tell you. ” 

“ You were not so squeamish always, Merrydew, But 
never mind that. There is no question now of playing that 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN". 


293 


profitable part. Kate is alrealy — you know- it very well — 
considered my wife — ” 

“ Yes/^ interrupted Merrydew, “ a pretty trick you 
played me with that at the club!’" 

Jack laughed. “1 have no wish, bless my heart! to 
disgrace her. One of these days the ‘ Deceased ’Wife's Sis- 
ter Bill " will be passsd — it will be an agreeable duty for 
Cholmley to help to pass it — and then she can have any 
comfort a proper marriage ceremony can give her.’" 

“You — yoiBre mad, Jack! Do you think Kate would 
ever listen to such a — such an immoral proposal?’" 

“ I imagine — do you know?"" said Jack, “ that from the 
true actress"s point of view there is nothing immoral but 
bad art. But, if she really has an inclination to be prud- 
ish, she will probably overcome it for the sake of her fa- 
ther. She is, 1 have no doubt, a paragon of filial love, 
and she will do anything rather than see her father prose- 
cuted for—"" 

“ Yes, yes,"" interrupted Merrydew, “ 1 see! 1 see where 
you"re dragging me! But let us get away from this. We 
must have a cab; 1 can’t walk any more."" 

While they were traversing the short distance from the 
park to Knightsbridge, Jack — to his intense gratification 
— overheard Merrydew exclaim to himself . . . . “Fiend- 
ish malignity! .... What, what on earth"s to be 
done . . ."" On the drive to Chelsea Jack smoked cigar- 
ettes and Merr 3 ^dew brooded on his desperate plight. When 
they entered the house the brightness and warmth affected 
Merrj'dew to a hopefuller mood: he glanced at his com- 
panion, the newl^'-admitted guest of the house; he did not 
look truculent or insensible to entreaty. 

“Come, Jack,’" said he when they had sat a few mo- 
ments, one on either side of the fire, in the library (which 
was also the smoking-room), “ you don’t mean it. You’ve 
been having a lark with me. You can’t insist upon doing 
as you said. You were, really, not serious; now, were 
you?” 

“lam as serious, Merrydew,” said he, “ and as inexor- 
able as Fate. And "" — turning to enjoy the fire better-- 
“ I’ve just been thinking we must begin to carry out our 
purpose. Cholmley must not come here for some time; 
will you be so good as write to him and say it will be as 
well if he does not call until the visit of Captain Parkin, your 


294 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


sori-iii-law, is at an end? Say you write it at the request 
of your daughter/^ 

“Oh, that's preposterous!" exclaimed Merrydew. “1 
can't write that; I've never written to Cholmley. Still, 
well, yes, I will." 

But, unfortunately, Merrydew's face was not a mask; it 
always showed pretty plainly each change of mood, or of 
thought. Parkin was watching him, and noting a certain 
insidious flash of the eye and hopeful raising of the eye- 
brow he said: 

“ Oh, no; you can't!" 

“ What?" said Merrydew. 

“ Do what you were thinking. It just occurred to you 
that you would write now to please me, and then call on 
Cholmley to-morrow to explain. You can't; because 1 
intend to stick closer than a brother to you till this affair is 
settled. And if it is not settled as 1 want it, as sure as 
your name's Merrydew, 1 shall prosecute." 

“ There you are again!" 

“ Well, you see, you won't believe me. I assure you I 
will." 

“ Oh, you can't be so unfeeling, and — and imgentle- 
manl3^" 

“ 1 can. Now, let us get on. I shall make it as easy 
for you as I can. I sha'u't ask you to help me with Kate, 
unless 1 see 1 can't manage her myself." 

“ You'll make nothing of her! I know her!" 

“We must between us. And it's worth remembering 
that what I told you the first night I saw you holds good 
still. My father will come round; he won't at his age re- 
member the slight difference between the one sister and 
the other. I'll even promise to pay you still the amount 
of the alimony." 

“ My dear fellow!" cried Merrydew, almost in tears to 
think that such pleasant fertile promises should be doomed 
to fail. “It really can't be done! it really can't! I wish I 
could get you to see it!" 

“ But it can! and it shall! unless, of course, it should 
turn out that Kate won't mind seeing her father in the dock 
of the Old Bailey. Come now; there’s pen and paper 
there; fire away. I would write the note for you myself, 
but I'm not such a dab at composition as you are; I can't 
turn neat sentences." 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 295 

Even in that dismal hour Merrydew’s vanity was agree- 
ably tickled by this little compliment, and he turned to the 
table and wrote a note, which Jack pronounced satisfac- 
tory, and which they stepped out together to post. When 
they returned the door happened to be opened to them by 
the maid whom Parkin had met in Battersea Park. 

“Go up into the drawing-rooni,^^ he whispered to her. 
“ 1 want to speak to you. 

When Merrydew was safe in the library he ascended the 
stairs and had a short interview with Jane, the result of 
which was that the girl — who said she always took Mrs. 
Parkin’s letters to the post — promised to bring to Captain 
Parkin any letter directed to Mr. Cholmley. 

Inter-communication being thus cut off as well as he saw 
how. Captain Parkin sat down to lay siege to Kate. This 
much may be said for him, that, after his fashion, he was 
really in love with her, and he did not intend, except as a 
final resource, to gain his purpose with her through his 
power over her wretched father. He hoped to win her as 
a lover — a hope which seems absurd to us who know Kate, 
and who know, too, that her heart was already in Walter 
Cholmley’s keeping. His hope, however, was sustained 
by one or two prejudices; one was, that all actresses, by 
virtue of their profession, must be accessible, and to some 
extent venal; another was that, such a man as Cholmley 
could only be deceived and encouraged by her because of 
his position and wealth; there could be no real passion be- 
tween them. 

Next day, and day after day, he assiduously courted her 
— taking care at the same time not to lose sight of her fa- 
ther, whom he virtually held prisoner. He talked with her 
on her favourite subjects, and he could talk very well; he 
had seen much of tlie theatre and its i^ersonnel abroad, and 
he had many agreeable and interesting anecdotes concern- 
ing them; he showed himself fond of his child, and gentle 
and good towards everybody. Above all, he made much of 
his cough, understanding very w'ell that a large-hearted 
woman is most likely to give her love where she bestows 
her sympathy and care. Yet he did not seem to get much 
nearer to her. When he tried to sit closer to her than mere 
friendliness demanded she would shrink away, and when 
he attempted to talk what he thought sentiment, she 
laughed it aside with some constraint, and a drawn look of 


296 


A KEVEIiEKB GENTLEMAN 


suspicion about her eyes. He doubted whether he was 
making himself understood, and meditated bolder be- 
haviour. 

The fact, however, is, Kate uiidersDood him pretty well, 
but she excused him to herself. “Poor man,"’' she 
thought, “ 1 must not be hard upon him after all he has 
endured. Perhaps he likes to sit with me and talk, and 
hang about after me, because of his memory of Ethel. I 
daresay he really means no harm, and it would be silly 
prudery to object to it, or to seem offended.'’^ 

Thus, at length, Sunday came, when Kate took her ease 
more than was possible during the week. It was not the 
Sunday of “ The Fortnightly Roview,^^ and Kate had 
ordered a very nice dinner to be prepared in honour of her 
guest; it was the first dinner she had been able to eat in 
his company. Perhaps (ho very agreeable meats and drinks 
inflamed Captain ParkiiFs passions more than usual; per- 
haps it was only that he had initiated in the course of the 
day that “ bolder behaviour he had been meditating — 
howsoever it came about— immediately after dinner, when 
Merrydew had withdrawn into the back drawing-room to 
take his nap, Captain Parkin astonished Kate by his de- 
claration. After standing and turning this way and that 
before the fire, he came and sat down beside her on her 
own soft little couch. 

“ Kate,’ ^ said he, laying his hand caressingly on hers, 
“ I cannot hold my tongue longer. You must-see how I 
feel towards you, how I have been bewitched by you ever 
since I came, how 1 follow you about like a fool! Oh, 
Kate! be kind!” 

He was so eager with passion, she was so taken at un- 
awares, and so fascinated for a momtiiit or two by the fire 
of his dark eyes, that he got all this uttered before she could 
say a word to stop bim. At length, trembling herself, 
and pale, she put hij hand from her — seizing it by the 
wrist, as she had done, she remembered, in that torri})le 
scene at Percy Circus, and the recollection of it brought 
back much of the feeling with which she had then regarded 
him — and held him back thus; she was so seated she could 
not well rise. 

‘‘How dare you, Mr. Parkin?” she said, in tones of a 
clear white heat. “ You must not speak to me like that!” 


A KEVEREND OEKTEEMAIT. 207 

“ Kate, Kate,^’ he pled, “ I mean you no barm! I can 
wait— I can wait! But say something to me!'^ 

“ Let me rise! DonH touch me!^^ she said, and rose 
free of him. “ Say something to you? What can I say 
but that I am ashamed of you— and ashamed of myself 
that I should have given you reason to think you might 
speak so to me! You are a wicked, abominable man! J 
feel, 1 know you are! But if you are anything at all of a 
gentleman, you will not look me in the face in my house 
again !’^ 

She was sweeping away from him where he sat, black 
and baffled— ‘away towards the door. He rose and inter- 
cepted her. 

“ Stay a moment !^^ said he, putting out his hand to de- 
tain her. She kept herself away from its touch. 

‘‘Father,^' said she (for Merrydew appeared from the 
back room in surprise), “ will you permit me to be insulLL'd 
by my own fire-side? You see how 1 am detained! come 
and help me!^^ 

“Jack, rnyboy,’^ expostulated Merrydew, mildly, while 
he approached uncertainly. 

“ Stand away, you old fool, and hold your tongue!’^ ex- 
claimed Jack. “ Or, rather, come and tell her why you 
are afraid even to open your mouth to help her!'’^ 

A livid pallor overspread Merrydew's face, and for a 
moment he looked at Parkin as if he would pierce him 
through. But it seemed to him as if a voice kept saying, 
“It’s all up! It’s all up! You must tell! You must 
tell!” At that juncture he could not let his daughter see 
or hear him make appeal to Parkin; besides, he knew that 
Parkin in his passion would be deaf to all entreaty. There 
was a dead silence for a second or two, during which Kate 
stood rooted in surprise, gazing from the one to the other. 
Then with difficulty he spoke. 

“ Kate, my dear, I have put myself very nyich— very 
much — in Captain Parkin’s power! I am in Captain 
Parkin’s debt!” 

“ You owe him money?” said Kate. “ Well, pay him 
back! If you have not enough, I can give it you!” 

“ Why can’t you make a straight tale of it?” sneered 
Parkin. Then turning towards Kate. “ He mis-states, 
and you misunderstand. The fact is — ” 


298 


A REVEREKD GENTLEMAN. 


“ Permit me/^ interriiiDied Merrydew. “ It’s that ali- 
mony, my dear, Ethel’s alimony!” 

“ Alimony?” exclaimed Kate. 

“ The plain truth is,” said Parkin, “ your father has ob- 
tained about two thousand pounds by false pretences and 
by forgery — six times twelve are seventy-two, and six, 
seventy-eight — seventy-eight forgeries!” 

“ Alimony? By forgery?” exclaimed Kate, aghast. 
“ What does it mean, father? Can’t you tell me?” 

“ You remember the alimony that was offered to Ethel? 
Well, we began to have it without your knowing, and we 
have had it ever since!” 

“ What, all the time? That money?” 

“ All the time,” said Parkin, “ up till now — month by 
month signing the name of Ethel Parkin! So you see the 
situation!” 

“ I would have refused it long ago,” said Merrydew, 
“ but how? It kept coming! Once begun, there was no 
stopping it as long as Ethel was supposed to be still alive!” 

“ Oh,” cried Kate, throwing herself into a chair, “ this 
is the most dreadful thing of all!” 

“ We — we can repay it,” suggested Merrydew. “ It is 
not such a large sum!” 

“It’s not the sum!” cried Kate. “It’s the shame! 
And you’ve made me a sharer in it! Father!” she ex- 
claimed, springing to her feet again, “ I believe it was for 
that — yes, I can see it was for that you kept Ethel’s death 
secret, and made me take her name! And you pretended 
it was necessary for the child’s sake! Oh, father, father! 
And that’s why you have been afraid to let me tell the 
secret! How could you have treated me so! and gone on 
year after year using the money and enjoying yourself at 
your club and everywhere! You have no conscience, fa- 
ther! not a scrap!” 

“ Eeally, my dear,” protested Merrydew, “your re- 
proaches and your accusations are most cruel and unjust! 
Did you not beg me day after day to find some means to 
ensure your possession of the child? Well, I found them 
— the only means? And I dared at the same time to run 
the risk of being found out in this — this mistake, all for 
your sake!” 

“ For my sake?” 

“How would you have been aiblo to go on the stage? 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 299 

how would you have been able to live to become the suc- 
cessful actress you are now, if it had not been for the 
money 1 bad? This money? If I have put conscience 
aside, I did it for you to begin with, and to please you! 
And this is your gratitude!'^ 

Kate turned away, and indulged in a few bursts of sob- 
bing. Parkin, whose resentment had now cooled to a 
moderate temperature, was much moved by the sight of 
her beauty in the attitude and emotion of distress. He 
itched to take her in his arms and comfort her. But as 
he thus felt she turned upon him, wiping her eyes. 

“ What have you done this for? Why have you made 
my father confess this to me? I suppose you have some 
end in view?’^ 

“It certainly,"" said Jack, “was not to distress you. 
It was partly — shall I say — in the hope that you would 
reconsider your view of me. You now know that all these 
years your father was drawing three hundred pounds a year 
from me — which I thought was maintaining in some com- 
fort my wife and child — I myself was living the best way 
I could on a mere pittance."" 

“ Dreadful! dreadful!"" said Kate. Merrydew went and 
leaned on the mantel, with his eyes on the fire. 

“ Don"t you think it would be natural — that I would be 
justified, if I took the fullest revenge? if I made known 
what your father has done, and let the hands of Justice 
take him to 23rison, put him in the dock of a criminal 
court, and then carry him away to kee^) company with all 
kinds of convicts?"" 

“ But you cannot! you will not surelv,"’ said Kate, “ do 
that!"" 

“If,"" said he, “I can be generous enough to refrain 
from doing it, surely I should have some generosity shown 
me in return. You understand me, Kate, I see."" 

“ That"s not generosity you want shown; it"s only re- 
venge in another form. You propose to disgrace and pun- 
ish me instead of my father."" 

“ No,"" said he; “ I only ask you to be what everybody 
believes you to be; I will not even ask you to be quite that 
yet; I am content to wait till 5 'Ou can get over your dis- 
inclination. "" 

She looked at him a uiotnent, in detestation of himself 


300 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


and his Jesuitical manners, and then looked towards her 
father. 

“ You hear his proposition, father?’’ 

“ It can’t, of course, be thought of, my dear. He had 
better send for a policeman at once.” 

Jack Parkin smiled. “ It must certainly be either the 
one or the other,” said he. “ I do not like to seem hard; 
but 1 cannot afford to lose my chance of you, Kate — and 
all is fair in love.” 

“Strange,” said she, meditatively, “the sort of love 
some men seem to feel. Will you give me a few days to 
consider your question — till Thursday?” 

Jack did not like so long a postponement of an answer, 
but he would not in such a matter seem ungracious; and, 
moreover, he was not sure but if he pressed her too hard 
now she might throw her father over — and so his purpose 
would be defeated. He signified therefore his wdlliiigness 
to wait till Thursday. He then invited Merrydew to go 
and smoke with him, and so leave Kate to rest. 

They had no sooner gone than Kate w^as surprised to see 
a man suddenly appear from the back drawing-room. It 
was Bottiglia. He came forward with his handkerchief in 
his hand. His kind, dark eyes were shining with wet. 

“ Ah,” he began at once, “ escuse me, Meess Kate, that 
I did hear the villain what he say! They say to me when 
I com in, ‘ Mr. Merrydew is in the back drawing-room;’ I 
go there, and he is Just gone, and I hear all — all! I could 
not help! Ah! I would ’ave like to come out to take ’irn 
by ze t’roatl’ — and he seized himself in that ghastly man- 
ner by way of illustration— “ but I kep’ close to ’elp some 
Oder way. '' Al diavolo, vagabondo! Alla ora T I say; ‘1 
will ’ave you yet, my gentlemans!’ ” 

“You are very kind, signpr,” said Kate; “but how 
can you do anything?” 

“ Meess Kate,” he said, looking very resolute, “ I did 
swear when the name of Mrs. Parkin was put upon you-- 
Mrs. Parkin!” he exclaimed, breaking off, “ Pif! I drop 
it, like t’at!” and he dropped his handkerchief to the floor. 
“ It is no more for me. I did swear to be your fanu ul 
servUeur!” 

“ You always have been very good and kind,” said 
Kate, somewhat perplexed how to take his fervid earnest- 
ness. 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN". 


301 


“ said he. “ Now you shall see. I shall make dis 
all right for you. I am bound! I am responsible! Ah 
va! I did know all about ze money from ze beginning! 
Oh, si! 1 thnk I advise your father to take it!’^ 

“ You, Signor Uottiglia?^^ 

“ 1 t’ink so. Si! 1 am a wicked man! what you say, 
not a scrap of conscience! I fought ze Mr. Parkin was, ob, 
very rich, and I say, ‘ What a devil! It is very well; take 
ze money !^ And your father tvvo-th-ee time give me some 
when business was bad. O^course, now I see it was a 
dam-fool blunder — escuseme. And I am responsible. So 
I begin at once — at once! to fink of a way!^^ and he rose. 

“ You are not going yet?^^ said Kate. ' 

“ SHI vous 'plait , said he. “ 1 must not see ’im — and 
1 must th'nk. Can I,'’"’ he asked, with a touch of con- 
straint, “ take a message to someone? I know ze office of 
Mr. Cho^mley.'’'’ 

“ Oh, no, no!’' exclaimed Kate. “ He must not know! 
not yet at least!" 

So Bottiglia performed his bow, and departed. 


CHAPTER XLVII. 

THE LAWYER SEES HIS WAY. 

“ Miss Ethel Newcome " probably never acted worse 
than on the Monday following those unrehearsed scenes of 
Sunday which 1 have just narrated. She acted with little 
interest or go; and there were not a few persons in the 
stalls, the dress-circle, and the boxes, who thought they 
knew the reason: “ Why, don't you know? Her husband 
has unexpectedly turned up to live upon her— a dreadful, 
whiskyfied person, they say!" (I believe there^ never was 
an actress on the English stage who has not been, to judge 
from public gossip, in some way connected with the drink- 
ing interest; either her father drinks, her brother drinks, 
her husband drinks, or she drinks herself.) The pity of it 
was, however, that Kate felt she was acting ill, and for 
that reason acted still worse. She could have cried with 
vexation as she withdrew to her dressing-room at the end. 
“ I'd better give it up!" she said to herself. “ I'd better 
run away and become a quiet governess again, and never 
put my head inside a theatre door — not a stage door, at 
any rate! But what would my poor silly old father do, 


302 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


left to be at the mercy of that dreadful man?^" She had 
little more than entered her room when an attendant came 
and said a gentleman wished to see her. A card was handed 
in; it was Mr. Cholmley's. 

“ Say I will see him at once/^ said Kate. “ What 
room is at liberty?^’ 

“ I can show him into the manager’s room, miss.” 

Kate had not seen Oholmley since the day Captain 
Parkin had first appeared — almost a week now. She had 
dreaded he would call, and yet she wondered more and 
more why he had not called. Now she welcomed his ap- 
proach as a source of strength and hope, while she per- 
plexed herself about the way in which she should tell him 
of the necessity of breaking with him; for that seemed to 
lier inevitable. 

When she entered the manager’s little room, Cholmley 
was standing in the middle of the floor with his hat in his 
hand. 

“You must forgive me, Kate,” he began at once, “ for 
coming in upon you like this; but this is not contravening 
your command — is it? — and, really, I couldn’t sit down in 
peace till 1 knew whether you were in trouble.” 

“ Oil, it’s nice and kind of you, Walter, to come,” she 
answered. “ But my command? What do you mean? 1 
asked you to come again soon when 1 saw you last, and I 
— 1 have been wondering why you haven’t — nor answered 
the note I sent you last week.” 

“ Ah, that’s odd,” he answered. “ I received no note 
from you. But just let us see where we are.” He drew a 
letter from his pocket. “ Do you know anything of that?” 
It was the note which Parkin had caused Merrydew to write. 

“No,” she answered, without looking at him after she 
had read the note; “ 1 don’t.” 

“ Your father, then,” said Cholmley, with a touch of 
judicial severity, “took upon himself to write that for 
some reason.” 

“ Don’t be hard on father, Walter,” she said. 

“ But, Kate,” said he, “ there’s another little mystery 
which seems connected with that: what about mv two 
notes?” 

“ Why — did you write to me?” 

“ 1 see, Kate, you didn’t get them, Now, w^’ye arrived 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


303 


at something; you wanted me to call at your house; your 
father didn’t. How is that?” 

“ Oh, Walter, please,” she answered, in evident distress, 
which she tried to conceal with a show of lightness, “ don’t 
cross-examine me! Don’t ask me! You had better go 
away, and — and — ” she couldn’t say it; something insisted 
on filling her throat to prevent utterance. 

“ My dear Kate!” he said, taking possession of her by 
both her hands. “ Listen to me a moment. We are not 
boy and girl, my dear, to have tiffs and jealousies — nor 
creatures in a play, to drag a passion up and down the 
stage wrapped in a preposterous misunderstanding. I love 
you, Kate, unreservedly, and 1 trust you completely!” 

” Oh, you have trusted me, Walter, more — more than I 
have ever deserved!” 

“ Come, you mustn’t say that of the Kate I know and 
believe in. I am not sure but 1 know my Kate better 
than she knows herself.” She raised her eyes to him for 
a moment, almost overcome by his tenderness. “ Come, 
now, dear,” he continued, “ trust me in this. Let us see 
clearly what it is that troubles you — oh, yes, you are, my 
poor girl, oppressed with trouble; I could even see it when 
you were on the stage to-night. ” 

The effect of his words on her was inexpressibly soothing 
and strengthening. 

” First,” he went on, “ I’ll tell you my suspicion. 
When I saw Captain Parkin last Tuesday 1 guessed he was 
the prodigal brother or something of the Mr. Parkin that 
was~l could see ‘prodigal scamp’ written on his face. 
But since then 1 have met one or two men of the H 5 ^acinth 
Club who have told me that your father introduced Cap- 
tain Parkin there as his son-in-law, and it is being said up 
and down, I find, that he is your rascally husband re- 
turned, CO make what he can out of you.” 

” People,” she exclaimed, flushing to her hair, “ are 
saying that? Oh, Walter, what—what did you think? My 
husband? Him my husband?” 

‘‘He is not your husband, then!” said he, eagerly, in- 
voluntarily tightening his hold of her hands. “ Why on 
earth did your father introduce him to these men as his 
son-in-law?” 

‘‘ Father is in very great trouble,” said Kate. 

“Perhaps this trouble is all his, then, not yours— and 


304 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAl^. 


you are feeling it for him?’ ■ She did not answer. “Can’t 
you trust me, Kate? I may happen to see some way to 
help him.” 

“ Oh, yes, yes, Walter,” she burst forth, “ 1 trust you! 
I must tell you! I should have told you long ago! Cap- 
tain Parkin was my sister’s husband; I am not Mrs. 
Parkin. I never was married at all! That is what I have 
wanted to tell you so long. ” 

“ Why!” he exclaimed, blushing like a boy, “you — you 
are not a widow?” 

“ No, Walter,” she said, looking down with an answer- 
ing blush. 

“ You are— just the Kate I knew at Hornsey? Oh, my 
dear!” 

Before she was aware he had her in his arms, and was 
kissing her. 

“You must be quiet, Walter dear,” said she, when she 
got herself free. “ I must tell you this trouble. But first, 
Walter, you must promise me you will not try to make me 
give father up. You will see what I mean.” 

So she told him, as briefly as she could, the whole story 
of Ethel’s sad fate, the alimony, and the rest, ending with 
a reserved recital of the scenes of Sunday, and the terms 
proposed by Captain Parkin for refraining from the pros- 
ecution of her father. 

“ The brute!” he exclaimed. “ The nasty cur! I shall 
call to-morrow, my dear, and see what’s to be done. Oh, 
don’t be afraid; I shall not make a row. But how I think 
I’ve been here long enough. 1 shall go and think about 
this. I shall find some deliverance for your father — some 
way out of the mess.” 

“ That,” said Kate, “ is what poor dear Bottiglia said 
he would do last night.” 

“ Is it?” said he, holding her hand. “ But for you, my 
dear, good girl, to sacrifice yourself! Nonsense! Now, 
don’t go home and spend the night in sleepless worry. If 
there is no other way the inexorable captain must be "some- 
how eliminated; he is a negative quantity. You don’t 
quite understand that. Never mind, my dear.” 

Cholmley, therefore, next morning early sought an in- 
terview with Kate’s father, who by that time had learnt 
that Cholmley knew all. It was rather embarrassing for 
Merrydew; he had an awkward consciousness that the big 


A REYEltEKD GEKTLEMAIT. 


305 


lawyer viewed him with little liking or respect. To his 
relief, the interview was at an end in a few minutes. 
Cholmley only wished to verify out of Merrydew’s own 
month the facts which Kate had told him about the ali- 
mony. In the course of this, Merrydew happened to let out 
that an instalment had arrived that very morning — a state- 
ment that arrested Cholmley's attention. 

“ By the way,” said he, “ doesuT that strike you as odd, 
that Captain Parkin should not have stopped it since he 
has learned how things really are?” 

“ It is odd, certainly,” admitted Merrydew, thoughtfully. 

“ Perhaps,^’ said Cholmley, “ the money after all is of 
little consequence to him. Do you know how his income 
is derived?” 

“ Income!” said Merrydew. “ I don’t know that he has 
anything but what his father allows him.” 

” A large allowance, I suppose. Still, three hundred 
pounds is a good deal to be careless about, even out of 
a large allowance. Do you think it is possible that his 
father has been paying you the three hundred pounds?” 

“Possible?” said Merrydew. “Yes, certainly. But 
he’s rather a tight-fisted old fellow.” 

“ Who is the London solicitor that forwards the money?” 

“ Slee, Slee & Son,” answered Merrydew, “ of Basinghail 
Street. ” 

Cholmley rose, thought a moment, and then said “ Good 
morning,” and went away. His habit of verifying facts 
suggested to him that an hour spent in driving to Sice’s 
oflice, having a word or two with Slee (who would readily 
accord a hundred to so great a man as Cholmley, Q.C.), 
and driving back again, might test the reality of the ap- 
parent fact that the alimony for Captain Parkin’s wife and 
child had been paid by Captain Parkin. He had no diffi- 
culty in getting the genial bald-headed Slee to answer such 
harmless-seeming questions as he put. He came away tri- 
umphant; he hiid got at the truth. The elder Parkin paid 
the alimony, although it was deducted from what had 
formerly been the amount of Captain Parkin's allowance. 
He had also already resolved on the next step to be taken: 
lie would appeal in person to the old man, who alone had 
the right to prosecute Merrydew; he would go down to 
Slierborne, in Yorkshire, at once. . 

He drove, therefore, from Basinghail Street to his 


306 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


office ill Westminster, looked out in Bradshaw the time 
of the earliest possible train he could catch, sent die 
of his clerks to Chelsea with a message for Mrs. Cholmley 
^that he was going away for a day or two on business, and 
wanted a small portmanteau packed — told the clerk to 
meet him at King’s Cross, and then sat down in excellent 
spirits to write a note to Kate. He told her where he was 
going, and urged her to keep up her courage and hope 
during his absence, for he might have good news for her 
on his return. Remembering the fate of his recent notes 
to Kate, he put this in his pocket, to give to his clerk when 
he should meet him at King’s Cross. He then went out, 
and, after a hurried lunch, took a cab to the station of the 
Great Northern Railway. He had just time to give his 
letter for Kate to his clerk, with instructions to deliver it 
only into the hand of Mrs. Parkin, when the guard’s whistle 
sounded, the train puffed out of the station, and he was on 
his way to Yorkshire. 


CHAPTER XLVIIL 

THE lawyer’s mission. 

It was between nine and ten o’clock when Cholmley 
reached Sherborne. The little wayside station was tenanted 
only by a creature who seemed half farm-labourer and half 
railway-porter, and there w’as no prospect of a vehicle to 
convey him through the dark country lanes other than a 
cart, wuth its shafts raised against the dull sky. He stood 
in anxious perplexity a moment, when he heard the sound 
of wheels and of a horse’s feet outside; he at once ran out 
in the hope of encountering some charitable farmer wdio 
would give him a “lift.” The man was driving away; 
Cholmley called, “ Hoi!” and he drew up. 

“ Excuse me stopping you, friend,” he said, when lie 
was by the side of the dog-cart; “ can you help me on the 
way a bit to Mr. Parkin’s, of Sherborne Hall?” 

“ By Jove!” exclaimed the man in the cart. “ I ought 
to know your voice! W^ould you mind standing better in 
the light of the lamp? Walter Cholmley! by all that’s 
wonderful! You don’t remember me, I suppose? George 
Cardigan.” 

“"Why, to be sure! George!” exclaimed Cholmley, 
grasping his hand. “ What a lucky find, my boy.” 


A HEVEREND GENTLEMAK. 


S07 

“Have you got your tra^DS? Jump up, said 

George. “ The nag wants to be off, and we can take you 
nearly all the way. What may you be going to Parkings 
about— if it’s a fair question?” he asked, when they had 
started off. “ Some sort of railway business, I suppose? 
The old man is said to have a lot of money in railways.^’ 

“No,” answered Cholmley; “ it is quite a private matter. 
But the fact is, I have never seen the old man before, and 
he doesn’t know I’m coming; so it^s a trifle awkward. 
V\i hat sort of old fellow is he? I suppose you know him.” 

“ Very well,” said George. “ I once was great chums 
with his son — but,” he added, with a perceptible touch of 
reserve, “ 1 haven’t met him for years.” 

“ Oh, you know Captain Parkin, do you?” 

“ Captain?” said George. “ Since when has he been 
captain? He used to flash about among the yeomanry 
here, but I never knew he was a regular captain.” 

“ He is not a particular friend of yours now, George, 1 
guess.” 

“Hang him! No,” said George, “he is not. 1 once 
felt like wringing his neck, and I wish I had done it. And— 
you won’t mind my saying it — if it’s on his business you’ve 
come to see his father, you may save yourself the trouble.” 

“ It’s about him I’ve come,” said Cholmley, “ though 
not on his behalf. He is no friend or client of mine, and 
if you dislike him very mortally, George, you won’t be dis- 
pleased perhai^s to know that I hope to checkmate one of 
his tricks.” 

“ By Jove!” exclaimed George. “ Look here, Walter, 
you’d better come home with me to my father’s to-night. 
It’s getting very late for us quiet country folk, and 1 don’t 
believe you would see old Parkin if you went on to the 
Hall.” 

Cholmley thanked him, saying that was much the better 
way, and then they lapsed into silence, save for a remark 
now and then about the distance, the condition of the roads, 
and the pace of the horse. Each (as he confessed after- 
wards) was meditating the propriety of taking the other 
into his confidence — until the shape of a cosy-looking, 
square-built house rose out of the darkness on the right, 
the bark of a yard-dog was heard, and George said, “ Here 
we are. ” 

Cholmley was introduced to the Cardigan family, and 


308 


A KEV'EREND GENTLEMAN. 


tliey sat down to supper, which was waiting George’s arrival. 
Soon after supper George asked his father’s permission to 
go into the study to have a talk and a smoke with his 
friend. VVhen they were thus seated, one on either side 
of the study fire, in an easy-chair, Cholmley began to ask 
what George had been doing since he had lost sight of him 
five or six years before. George told him that he had 
grown to hate London and to hate law, and the death of 
an eccentric aunt (Mrs. Wantock, indeed) unexpectedly 
making him the owner of considerable wealth in both 
money and estate, he had returned with relief and pleasure 
to country pursuits; he now lived for the most part on his 
property in the neighbourhood of York; it was by the 
merest accident he had been about between Scarborough 
and Sherborne for the last two days. 

“ It’s the kind of accident,” said George, with a shy 
kind of solemnity, “ that makes me, by Jove! believe in 
Providence. It must be Providence that brought you up 
to me to-night, and made you tell me about Jack Parkin.” 
He paused to puff at his pipe. 

“ I don’t altogether understand, George,” said Cholmley. 

“I daresay not. There’s something I must tell you. 
Perhaps you know the kind of man Parkin is — with women, 
I mean.” 

Then he told the story of Eleanor’s connection with 
Parkin — and that done, he asked Cholmley if he knew 
whether there was any one with Parkin now. Cholmley 
did not know, but he reciprocated George’s confidence by 
telling him concerning Parkin’s appearance at Kate Merry- 
dew’s house, and of the atrocious dilemma he had pre- 
sented to her and her father on his discovery of the frauds 
which had been perpetrated upon him. In the course of 
this the identity of Kate with the actress, Ethel Newcome, 
had to be brought forward, and it astonished George very 
much. 

“ And that,” said he, when the narrative was finished, 
“ is what you’ve come to see the old man about. Let me 
give you a ‘ tip:’ when you talk to him make as little as 
you can of what the parson has done — he hates him, I 
know, and I believe would pursue and prosecute him to the 
death — but crack up what Miss Merrydew has done for his 
grandchild; the old chap has a very soft side about women, 
and I know he was fond of the Merrydew girls, and capital 


A REVEHEND GEKTLEMAN. 


309 


girls they were. Who would think, eh? that Miss Merry- 
dew was the daughter of such a rip of a father?^’ 

Thus they sat and talked awhile longer. When they 
were about to separate for the night, George asked when 
Cholmley intended to return to London. Cholrnley said 
he did not quite know, it depended on what success he 
might have in his errand. 

“ Whenever you do go,^’ said George, with a dark look, 
“ I shall go with you.^’ 

Npt morning after breakfast Cholmley set out upon his 
mission to the Hall. Mr. Parkin was among his orchids, 
which responded to his constant love and care, better far, 
no doubt, than his graceless Jack had done. He came to 
Cholmley, looking very hot and awkward and shy, as we 
have seen him before. He nodded “ how-de-do, stroked 
down his shining bald head, and waited for Cholmley to 
begin. Cholmley availed himself of George Cardigan’s 
hint in telling his story, and for Kate’s sake, as much as 
to spare the father shame for his son, he omitted mention 
of Captain Parkin’s terms to Kate. The old man did not 
interrupt him once, only at intervals he grunted, stroked 
down his hard, close-shaven mouth, and all the while kept his 
eyes on the floor. It was perplexing to talk to such a listen- 
er; there was no telling how he was taking what he heard. 

You want me to do something, I suppose,” said he, at 
length, looking Cholmley in the face; “ I’ve nought to do 
wi’t.” 

Cholmley urged, in clear, lawyer-like phrase, that since 
the money had been fraudulently obtained from him he 
was the person to decide whether the offender should be 
prosecuted or no. 

“Humph! You think so. I don’t.” And he looked 
thoroughly obdurate. 

“ 1 happen to be a lawyer,” said Cholmley, “ and I 
assure you that is so.” 

“ Humph! I must see Jack about it. The money was 
Jack’s to begin with. But if 1 was Jack, I’d ha* the par- 
son up in court. He’s been the ruin — him and his — o’ 
that lad! from the day ho went to his school in London 
there wasn’t a trick that he knew himself but he taught 
him. I’d ha’ the law o’ him! by George, I would!’’ 

Cholmley (who was both interested and amused with the 
odd, obstinate, old man) quietly and patiently pled that if 


310 


A REVKRKNl) GE^sTLEMAK. 


Merrydew were prosecuted the real sufferer would be rather 
his daughter than he, and she surely deserved tio punish- 
ment but rather thanks lor her motherly care of the child. 
He even went so far as to say, on his own responsibility, 
that the money would be refunded; in which case, he 
urged, surely prosecution would be vindictive. The old 
mail only insisted, “ Jack must settle it. The money was 
Jack’s."’^ Then Cholmley told him that his son had pro- 
posed to settle it in scandalous fashion, if the parson^s 
daughter would surrender herself to him. 

“Humph! Like enough,^’ said the old man. “It’s 
just like him. He’s a bad lad, real bad. And in her 
house, did you say?” 

At that instant a maid entered. “ A telegraph, sir,” said 
she, with a hesitating eye on her master, “ for t’gentleman.” 

“ For me?” said Cholmley. 

He tore the red envelope open and read: “ Parkin ill, 
dying perhaps. Bring his father. — Kate.” 

“ You want to see your son about this business,” said 
he to the old man. “ Read that. Perhaps this is your 
only chance to see him at all. 1 must go back to London 
at once. You’d better come with me.” 

“ Dying, eh!” exclaimed the old man. “ But I never 
was in London in my life!” and he smiled a smile, the sur- 
prising sweetness of which opened up for Cholmley a new 
view of the old man’s character. 

Cholmley perceived, too, as by a kind of instinct, that 
the way to manage him was to take gentle, firm possession 
of him; so he took it for granted that he had consented to 
accompany him to London. He looked at his watch, asked 
him to get a few things put in a portmanUau for himself, 
said he would call for him in two hours, and, before the old 
man could utter an articulate objection, he was gone. 

When Cholmley, at the end of two hours, returned driv- 
ing the parsonage dog-cart, he was surprised to see the old 
man trudging down the lane to meet him carrying his old 
carpet-bag. He suddenly experienced a sensation like an 
inclination to cry. It was not so much the ready, simple 
submission of the tough old fellow that touched him, as 
the sight of his pathetic figure, somewhat bent, and ill- 
cared for, with his coat buttoned awry, that suggested all 
the loneliness and unloveliness of his life. It made him 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


311 


thiuk, too, more kindly of the son lying stricken in Lon- 
don; he himself had had a hard-natured, hut devoted fa- 
ther, and ho said to himself, “ If it had not been for the 
dear old mother my father and I might have quarrelled as 
these two have done; father would have gone on eating his 
obstinate, proud old heart out with remorse, and 1 should 
have had by now a pretty crop of wild oats ready to reap.’^ 
“ You needn’t have bothered wi’ a trap,” said the old 
man, “ I’m a good walker.” 

Cholmley turned, and drove without stopping to the sta- 
tion, where they met George Cardigan with a rug on his 
arm and a little portmanteau in his hand. 

“ What,” said Parkin to him, “ are you going to Lon- 
don, too.^” 


CHAPTER XLIX. 

UNITED. 

It is necessary to go back a little to explain the telegram 
sent to Ciiolmley by Kate. Merrydew’s public introduc- 
tion of Captain Parkin as “ my son-in-law ” had, as I have 
already signified, attracted some attention. The Autolyci 
of the press had got hold of the fact, and made the most of 
it. In several papers there circulated a statement — the 
force of which was eked out by points of interrogation and 
of exclamation — to the effect that Mrs. Parkin (known on 
the stage as “ Ethel Newcome ”) was not a widow; for her 
husband had just returned home after some years’ absence 
on military duty. What, then, it was asked, was to be- 
come of a certain legal M. P. ? Many people read that in 
their Sunday paper, and passed it over with an “ Oh, in- 
deed!” But there was one, a woman, lying in bed late in 
the afternoon in a frowsy “ second-floor back,” who having 
read that read no farther. The passage seemed to burn 
her eyes, and through her eyes to burn her already seared 
soul. That woman was Eleanor Cardigan. 

With a wild heart and throbbing brain she rose, and 
dressed, and went out. She had no clear purpose in her 
mind; she was merely driven into motion by the turmoil 
of her feeling. She imagined Jack Parkin seated in con- 
jugal comfort and serenity in the home of his wife, while 
she was a vagabond of the pavement, without friends, 
almost without food! He was received as if he were the 


312 


A REVEKEND CtENTLEMAN”. 


moj t spotless of Puritans, while she had to drink the cup 
of social disgrace to the dregs! How was it: — was it the 
decree of a just Providence or of unjust mankind, that the 
woman alone should be punished for the sin of herself and 
of the man? He not only went scot-free, but was promot- 
ed to a paradise of fat enjoyment, while she sweltered in 
an abyss of want and despair! Thus, in wailing bitterness 
of soul she wandered about the streets that Sunday night, 
observing no one, knowing not where she went. 

Quieted by sheer exhaustion of mind and body, she re- 
turned very late to her lodging, and slept far into the fol- 
lowing day. The storm of feeling which had racked her 
had left behind merely a dull curiosity as to the truth of the 
paragraph she had read. How could she verify the facts? 

Having dressed carefully, she went out as it grew dusk. 
She walked to the Variety Theatre, found the stage door, 
and begged the doorkeeper to inform her where Mrs. Par- 
kin lived. 

“ Don’t know no sech person,” said the man. 

“ Miss Ethel Newcome is the same — is rhe not?” 

“ PT-’aps she is,” said the man. “ But we don’t give no 
jDrivate addresses here.” 

“ My good man,” said she, “ it’s of great consequence 
to Mrs. Parkin that you should give me her address. If 
you don’t, you will have to answer for it.” 

Something commanding in her manner overbore the 
man’s suspicion of her appearance, and, grumbling, he 
gave the address. 

In less than an hour she was in Cheyne Walk. She 
scarcely knew why she had come, but as she walked to and 
fro on the pavement glancing at the lighted windows of 
Mrs. Parkin’s house, a strong desire came upon her to see 
again the man who had been so much to her, and to whom 
she had been so much — to try whether her old power over 
him was gone.^ She did not wish, she assured herself, to 
have him again with her; in her desire to see him there 
was no passion, only curiosity; passion was dead. 

A hansom drove up empty, and waited. Presently the 
door opened, and a man and a woman came out, while 
Eleanor turned and walked away a little to escape notice. 
The woman — no doubt Mrs. Parkin setting off to the thea- 
tre — entered the cab, and was driven away. The man 
stood a moment looking after the cab: who could it be but 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


313 

Ihe womaii^s Imsbaiicl, Jack Parkin? A mad rush of jeal- 
ousy suffused Eleanor’s heart, and swept in a giddy, blind- 
ing flood to her brain, so that she had to cling to the rail- 
ings to su[)poit herself. This man had been hers! . . . 
hers! . . . and now — He evidently observed her: he came 
towards her; but she could not run away; she felt as if 
chained to these railings, while her knees trembled at his 
approach. 

“ Ah, yev Bacco ! You are ill, madame!’’ 

It was not Jack’s voice; it was the voice of a foreigner, 
and Eleanor recovered herself a little. 

“1 am well enough,” said she. “ Does Captain Parkin 
live in that houte?” 

“ Yes,” said the man. ‘‘ He lives there at present. Do 
you wish to speak with him? 1 will take you in — ver 
Bacco ‘ 

” Oh, no, no!” 

“ I will send him, then. ” And away the man sped into 
tlie house before she could say nay. 

She longed to run away, but she could not. AVhile she 
trembled in every limb, she wondered whether he would 
know her, and what he would think of her. She saw him 
appear in the doorway bareheaded; he stood a moment in 
the light glancing this way and that, and she recognised it 
was he. lie came down the steps, and her rising heart 
almost choked her. He saw her and came. Her breath 
came in quivering sobs. She felt his searching gaze upon 
her, but she could not look up. 

“ Good God!” he exclaimed. Eleanor!” 

One wild cry — half sob, half shriek — burst from her. 

Great heavens!” he said. ” What! — what! My poor, 
poor girl!” 

“ Don’t!” she cried. ‘‘ Don’t speak to me!” 

She felt from his tone what he thought her, and her 
pride rose in a frenzy of rebellion. He murmured inco- 
herent soothing sounds, and tried to put his hand on her 
shoulder. She started away from him. 

“ Don’t pity me! D’ 3 mu hear? I won’t be pitied! Don’t 
touch me!” 

“Nell! Nell! My dear girl!” 

At the sound of the familiar name and his attempt to 
take her hand, she turned and fled with staggering steps. 
He followed for some distance close behind her, softly call- 


314 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


iiig her to stay, bat at length, as one or two passengers 
curiously noted them, he gave up the pursuit. 

Eleanor hurried away she knew not whither. Oh, how 
she hated him and his scorching pity ! . . . How she loved 
him, and how she hated herself for being weak enough and 
foolish enough to love him! . . . She thought — and found 
for the time— ease from her distracting pain in the kind of 
Nepenthe to which for some years she had become habitu- 
ated. 

As for Jack Parkin, he was smitten with amazement and 
horror. Whenever he had thought of Eleanor since their 
parting he had imagined her as she had been in their wan- 
dering days, instinct with the abounding joy and passion of 
life; to see her, therefore, as she now was — a fire sinking 
into ashes — was a mortal shock to him. He had never 
been wilt idly or consciously cruel to a woman, hut here he 
was caught as in a vice by the conviction that he was re- 
sponsible for the diabolical cruelty of this result. A des- 
jieiate pity for the woman whom he had once loved con- 
sumed him with an ineffectual fire. If he could only undo 
what he had done! But he was not so consummate a fool 
as to believe that possible. If he could only make some 
recompense to her! . . . He went out into the street 
once and again during the evening to see if she had re- 
turned, hut he saw nothing of her. . . . When he went 
to bed he was racked with his cough (for he had caught 
cold in his excursions into the night air): he could not 
sleep, and in the solitude and darkness he had a sudden 
vision of himself as he was. He ran his mind’s eye over 
the whole course of his life, and turned from himself in 
disgust and despair; he recalled how he had been his fa- 
ther’s hope and pride: his days had been set before him, 
bright all through, and he had charged them with dark and 
hideous memories. 

Towards morning he slept, but for so short a time that 
he had not rested when he rose. All day he was somnolent 
and oppressed with the experience of the evening before. 
When he recalled the appearance and tones of Eleanor he 
shuddered. Yet he longed for night; and when it came 
at length, he went out into the street (altogether careless 
of the surveillance he had set himself over Merrydew) to 
look for Eleanor again. He came upon her under the 
archway of tlje house, but with a cry of surprise she fled 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


315 


from him. He went and stood by the rirer-side to see if 
she would return. He thought he caught sight of her 
once and again, but when he approached her she escaped. 
In his weakness and excitement he began to wonder if she 
was going to haunt him — if the one was thus eagerly to 
seek, and the other as earnestly to avoid, a meeting during 
all the rest of their days. He felt as if he had already got 
into a habit which he could not break away from. To and 
fro he went opposite the house by the river-side, while it 
seemed to him that the blear-eyed street-lamps watched 
him in wonder, and the towers of the bridge scowled at 
him over the dull-flowing river. When he caught sight of 
the dark, flitting woman'’s figure he made towards it; and 
the more she evaded him, the more obstinate became his 
desire to come to speech with her. At last the dark figure 
waited for him when he approached; but when he went 
near he saw it was not Eleanor. Then, tired and breath- 
ing painfully (for his cough had again begun to tear him), 
he entered the house and went to his room. Sick with dis- 
gust of himself and of all things, he took a reckless draught 
of brandy to restore his ebbing strength, threw himself, 
half-undressed, upon the bed, and drew about him a fine 
fur rug which his father had given him years before upon 
Iris birthday. Ah, the poor lonely old man! what was he 
thinking of then? Oh, that he could forget him, himself, 
and every one! His life had become a tangle, which could 
iiever be set right! Presently he found temporary oblivion 
in sleep. 

Fate, however, was rapidly hurrying him and his former 
paramour together, to sweep them into complete oblivion. 
The doings of Fate seem often to have so much intelligent 
purpose, that we are tempted to declare, “ Here is no 
blind, unreasoning destiny, but a clear-seeing, calculating 
Providence!” 

Eleanor had really fled from Jack’s presence that night 
on his first appearance, and had not returned. But as she 
hastened away from Cheyne Walk in a semi-delirium of 
rebellion and despair, the foreigner who had spoken to her 
the evening before (and who was no other than Bottiglia) 
came up with her. She permitted him to speak, but she 
scarcely knew whether she answered him. Through the 
conflict of her own thoughts and feelings she became con- 
scious that he understood something of her situation, (ind 


316 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


wished to know who she was. That she resented; she 
tried to get away from him, but he kept by her side telling 
her a story which soon she found had something to do with 
her; she could never have re-told the story, but she kept 
this as its heart and essence: that the woman, in whose 
house Jack Parkin lived, was not his wife, but another 
whom he was trying to ruin. Then a dark longing which 
had possessed her since the evening before — the longing to 
be done with all this futile and savage turmoil of life — 
began to resolve itself into a purpose with a double shape. 
The longing included now not herself alone, but Jack. It 
was well that she should cease from this life of pain and of 
despair — and it would be well that he should cease also. 
The purpose forming in her gave her an ecstatic joy — a 
mingling of satisfaction that she would be doing a good 
deed in saving this other woman from a life like what her 
own had been, and of fierce delight that then Jack Parkin 
(her own Jack!) would be hers for evermore! She did not 
quite know when the foreigner left her side, for she walked 
on and on, nursing her secret joy and hope for the mor- 
row, and she only came to herself when she discovered that 
she had made her way to her lodging, and that she was in- 
tercepted by her landlady, a vile-tongued virago, who de- 
manded arrears of rent. 

“ Wait till to-morrow,^^ she said to the woman; “ it will 
all be settled then.'’’ 

She hugged anew to her heart her intention of relief 
from all these sordid cares: to-morrow she would not re- 
turn, but the woman would find property enough of hers 
to.extinguish her debt. She spent great part of the night 
looking through her few effects, calmly assorting and fold- 
ing her clothing, and with her heart kept desperately in 
subjection, reading and then burning at her caudle some 
carefully preserved letters. 

Ill the morning Jack Parkin awoke cold, and violently 
coughing. With one extreme spasm he found a sudden 
gush of blood in his mouth, which almost choked liim. 
He knew what had happened; he contrived to reach the 
bell-pull, rang, and then lay back, feeling his life oozing, 
oozing away. 

“I can expect nothing of them,” he said to himself, 
thinking of Merrydew and his daughter; “ I have done my 
best to make them hate me. I had better die. But I must 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 317 

see her again! Poor, poor girl! My God! whafc a fool, 
what a brute I^ve been!” 

But as soon as they knew his plight they came — both 
Kate and her father; the first instincts of human kindness 
swept away all other feeling. A doctor was sent for at 
once. But before he came, Parkin, fixing his eyes on his 
hosts, held out a hand to each. 

“ Forgive me,” he murmured. “ I think 1 have been 
mad. . . . Never thought 1 could have been hard upon a 
woman.” 

Kate burst into tears, while Merrydew pressed his hand 
and muttered, “ All right, Jack, my boy.” 

The doctor came, forbade the risk of undressing, and 
prescribed perfect quiet and a sleeping-potion. He de- 
clared, aside to Kate, that the patient was in a very dan- 
gerous condition. It was then that Kate sent the telegram 
to Cholmley. 

As the day wore on, after he had swallowed his sleeping- 
draught,, it became clear that the patient’s head was affect- 
ed. He became restless, and talked incoherently, address- 
ing himself to “ Nell,” and sighing with labour, “ Horrible! 
Horrible! Poor, poor girl!” He took the beef-tea that 
was brought him, however, in the middle of the afternoon, 
and lay so quiet again, that Kate ventured to leave him in 
charge of the maid, Jane. Thus the grey afternoon changed 
to the dusk of evening, when Bottiglia chanced to come in, 
and, hearing of Jack’s condition, visited the sick-room. 

“Do he sleep?” asked he, in a low voice, of the girl; 
yet his voice was not so low but that it was overheard, and 
awoke evidently a train of memory. 

“ No, no,” was spoken distinctly from the bed. “ I’ll 
go; yes, I must go! She expects me!” 

Bottiglia precipitately retired to report what had been 
said to him. He had no sooner gone than the patient rose 
from the bed, saying (“ most sensible-like,” as the girl 
afterward declared), “ Poor girl! Yes, it is the least I can 
do. Pity is nothing.” 

The girl was scarcely astonished to see him put on his 
coat, and she let him leave the room, thinking he was going 
to her mistress. She watched him descend the stairs slow- 
ly but steadily; but when she heard the street door slam, 
her heart bounded with an undefined fear, and she went to 
her mistress. A word or two was sufficient. Merrydew 


318 


A KEVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


descended the sinks with Bottiglia after hirn. From the 
doorstep they saw Jack crossing the road with a woman. 
Merrydew followed, requesting Bottiglia to keep back a lit- 
tle; he went near, but they did not heed him. They stood 
for a moment in the light of a lamp, looking each in the 
face of the other. 

“ 1 have come, Nell, you see,^^ said Jack. “ My poor, 
dear neglected dove!’ — he strained her in his arms — “ We 
shall never be parted again! Never! We shall go away 
together!” 

“ Ah, my dear,” said she, with no sign of surprise; “ at 
last! at last! How cruel, cruel you have been to me. Jack! 
But that is pa'^t. It is all over now, and the pain of it. 
We shall go — go together, and forget it all. It is best for 
us both, my dear. You believe it is best!” 

“ Yes,” he said, “ it is best!— it is best!” 

“ Come!” said she, and drew him to the steps close at 
hand which led down to the river. Her intention dawned 
upon Merrydew, and suddenly he called aloud. Jack 
turned, and, perhaps, because his giddy head lost its bal- 
ance, or because a stronger will than his own was moving 
him, he and the woman together were precipitated into the 
turbid, swiftly-ebbing stream. 


CHAPTER L. 

THE CONCLUSION OF THE WHOLE MATTER. 

It was a tragic sight which met the eyes of the threo 
travellers from Yorkshire when they entered the house two 
hours later. Merrydew received them in the hall, and by 
the reluctant hands and the cold glances they gave him ho 
was disagreeably reminded of the shady position in which 
he stood. Kate came forward and delivered him. 

“ Mr. Parkin,” said she, “ are you strong to bear bad 
news? Your son ... he was very ill, poor young man 
. . . he got up in his delirium and went out ... he fell 
into the river . . . with a woman, who, I am told, has been 
hanging about to speak to him for three nights. ... He 
must have known her before. . . . They were drowned!” 

“Humph! Humph!” was all the poor old man said; 
but his complexion turned an ashy grey. 

“ Have they been found?” asked Cholmley, in an awed 
voice, 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


319 


“ They are in there,” said she. 

She looked round, uncertain what to do next. The old 
man went to the door she indicated: it was that of the 
room which Merrydew called the library. Kate opened the 
door, and they moved in in silence. 

The bodies lay close together on the long centre table, 
with their heads towards the door. There seemed a singu- 
lar reluctance in those who entered to meet the vacant gaze 
of the glassy eyes — to permit themselves to guess at the in- 
timacy of the relation between the old man's heir, and at 
the mysterious woman whom they had never seen alive. 
They stole softly round to the foot of the table, with half- 
averted eyes; but when they did look they were attracted 
to continue looking; on the faces of the dead there was a 
strangely beatified expression, and something of the fresh- 
ness of youth. 

“ When they were found,” whispered Kate to Cholmley, 
“ her arms were about him.” 

Cardigan, who had hitherto hung back as being not im- 
mediately concerned, came forward when he saw' the inter- 
est depicted on the faces of the others. 

“What!” exclaimed he. “Good heavens! It's Nell! 
My dear Nell! Poor girl. . . . My sister!” cried he, 
looking round upon the company. 

“ Your sister?” said Kate, laying her hand compassion- 
ately on his arm. “ We did not know her!” 

“You remember,” said he, “ my telling 3'ou once in 
Wales they were engaged to be married?” 

“Yes, yes,” echoed the old man; “ they were.” 

All present knew' the story of the erring pair. Simul- 
taneously, am] as if unconsciously, they turned their eyes 
on Merrydew, who shrank away and left the room: their 
looks seemed to say this, like so much else, was his doing. 

“We little expected,” said Cholmley, turning to Mr. 
Parkin, “ this solution of our difficulty.” 

“ 'Twas the best thing we could do!” said the old man, 
looking at his son. “ But "—the words choked him— “ he 
was my only lad!” He uttered a single rending sob, 
kissed the boy who had been the darling of his tough old 
heart, and turned, and hurried from the room. 

As for Merrydew, he wandered away upstairs, lingering 
uncertainly here and there, and at length finding himseii 
in the room that had been occupied by the drowned man. 


320 


A REVEREND GENTLEMAN. 


There was neither fire nor light in the room, except a flick- 
ering refiection on the ceiling from a street-lamp. It 
struck upon him a terrible sense of humiliation and desola- 
tion; his future was in that moment revealed to him; it 
would be as that room, cold and cheerless, and shunned of 
those who sought the warmth of wholesome friendship, and 
the light of wise counsel. Yet he had no desire to be rid 
of the meagre life that remained to him; he could not 
understand the state of mind of any one who should hurry 
himself out of the world of meat and drink, of men and 
women, into the cold realm of shades, of darkness, of noth- 
ingness. 

^ ^ ^ ^ 

And now before I let the curtain finally drop upon the 
men and women who have been my companions for many 
an anxious day, let me say a parting word about them. 
Little Ethel Parkin lives with her new grandfather, and 
she runs about the house and grounds all day, softening 
and cheering the old man's heart. 

Kate Merrydew has been for some months Mrs. Walter 
Cholmley. She is still on the stage, but she contemplates 
leaving it soon; for this strange thing has come to pass: 
now that she has a husband and household duties she cares 
less and less for the applause of the theatre, she becomes 
less and less able to represent characters in a play, less and 
less able to show the agitating emotions of the stage. 

And the Reverend Gentleman, who has been the arch- 
mischief-maker in our story, has lost his influence for good 
or for evil. lie still lives — a mean, selfish old man — in the 
house of his daughter, though he avoids both her and her 
husband as much as he can. His daughter allows him a 
moderate amount of pocket-money, and he slips in and out 
of the house very quietly. He is still a member of the Hya- 
cinth Club, where he spends a great part of his time smok- 
ing his pipe (he can not afford cigars now), imbibing small 
but frequent doses of whisky and water, reading French 
novels and instructing and amusing the ingenuous youth 
of the club by dissertations (with appropriate instances) on 
the Conduct of Life. He is liked by some, disliked by 
others, but he is generally considered a person “ of no ac- 
count.^' 


THE END. 


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37. Roland Oliver. By Justin McCarthy ^ 

88. Sheba. By Rita 30 

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47 - Mrs. Bob. By John Strange Winter 30 

48. Was Ever Woman in this Humor Wooed. By Chas. Gibbon 30 

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59. Plain Tales prom the Hills. By Rudyard Kipling 50 

60. Dinna Forget. By John Strang© Winter 3 ) 

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76. The Talking Image op Urur. By Franz Hartmann, il.D 50 

77 . A Scarlet Sin. By Florence Marryat .50 

78. By Order op the Czar. By Joseph Hatton 50 

79. The Sin op Joost Avelingh. By Maarten Maartens 50 

80. A Born Coquette. By The Duchess 50 

81. The Burnt Million. By James Payn 50 

82. A Woman’s Heart. By Mrs. Alexander 50 

83. Syrlin. ByOuida .... 50 

84. The Rival Princes. By Justin McCarthy and Mrs. C. Ih-aed 50 

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86. The Parting op the Ways. By Betham Edwards 50 

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92. A Woman op the World. By F. Mabel Robinson 50 

93. The Baffled Conspirators. ByW.E. Norris 50 

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100. The Blind Musician. By Stepniak and William Wesiall .50 

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102. The Wages op Sin. By Lucas Malet 50 

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104. The Love OP A Lady. By Annie Thomas 50 

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